


Glasses, Coins and Golden Rings (PG Mom-Safe Edit)

by nubianamy



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Civil War, M/M, Revised Version
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-11
Updated: 2013-12-11
Packaged: 2018-01-04 07:31:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1078252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nubianamy/pseuds/nubianamy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles and his mother have worked the farm together since his father left for the War of the Rebellion, ten years ago in 1862. His best friend Heather is the only one who knows what happened on the day the soldiers came through their valley, and the improbable hope to which they both hold.</p><p>(PG de-smutted version)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Glasses, Coins and Golden Rings (PG Mom-Safe Edit)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Glasses, Coins and Golden Rings](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1076012) by [nubianamy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nubianamy/pseuds/nubianamy). 



> Pretty much what it says. This is the cleaned-up version of [my Sterek Civil War romance](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1076012) that I gave to my parents because they love the Civil War and wanted to read it, and it just felt easier without requiring them to wade through all the boy smut. There's plenty of romance remaining, though. 
> 
> Written for the Teen Wolf Big Bang. Beautiful art by containerpark can be seen at <http://containerpark.livejournal.com/2922.html>
> 
> This story was inspired by the episode 3x02 Chaos Rising, in which Stiles' longstanding friendship with the character Heather was introduced. Basically, I wanted Stiles to have every opportunity to get married to the girl next door and be respectable, and for him to reject it in favor of an impossible dream.
> 
> It's a songfic, because everything I write is inspired by music in one way or another. The lyrics to "Reunion Hill" and a link to the song by Richard Shindell are provided at the end, since they contain spoilers for the story.
> 
> I have not given Stiles' father a name, because the fact that we don't know what it is is an important part of the show, but his mother is essentially an OC, so I felt freer to play with her.
> 
> An apology: historical fiction is not my genre. I really, really don't know anything about the American Civil War, nor about the military. Pretty much all of what I know about this time period came from quick and dirty Internet research. It still took me hours and hours, but any inaccuracies are definitely my own fault. I've gone for flavor rather than rigor. Thanks to penthea for beta-reading.
> 
> Warnings for angst-ridden descriptions of picking up one's life after war (but no actual descriptions of war), culturally entrenched sexism and homophobia, and over-the-top Sterek-flavored romance. If that's your cup of tea, please enjoy.
> 
> -amy

 

* * *

 **_Montgomery Village, Maryland, north of Washington, DC  
_ ** **_September 1872_ **

Stiles woke as he usually did: to the sound of Elliott crowing his fool head off, making him wonder not for the first time what God must have been thinking when he invented roosters.  He rolled to one side of the tick mattress, swallowing on the sour taste of sleep, and opened one eye.  It was still dark, but according to Elliott, it was long past time to get up and moving.  Elliott was probably right.

“The farm ain’t going to run itself,” he muttered, his father’s words on his own lips.  It made him feel a little disgruntled, to be talking so much like his father, but he figured as long as no one heard him but himself and God, he could probably live with that.  

Stiles struggled into his clammy breeches and managed to plant his feet into his boots, waiting at the side of his bed.  It wasn’t the most mannerly thing to wear his boots into the house, but he’d stepped in too many puddles in his socks on the way from the door to the back room in the damp, clammy fall.  Currently, he only owned one pair of socks without holes, and until he managed to wrangle a new pair out of Heather, he wanted to keep his socks as dry as he could.  There was nothing worse than wet socks. 

He could hear his mother stirring.  Usually, he managed to get up before her and light a fire in the stove.  It wasn’t that she wasn’t a tough Yank herself, but Stiles didn’t want his mother to ever have cause to say he wasn’t pulling his weight, especially not as long as it was just the two of them, less’n he counted Jess and Annie, the hired help. 

Pulling his weight was a matter of course when you were the man of the house.  It was still hard to respond when other people called him _Mister Stilinski,_ but there hadn’t been anybody else to call that in almost ten years.  He might as well start agreeing when folks called it _his farm._   His and his mother’s, and that was just a fact.

“You can keep your jo-fired morning speech, Mr. Elliott,” he called, knocking the frost off the milk pail waiting on the back porch.  “Crowing your fool head off like somebody cared what you had to say.”

“Stiles,” his mother shushed, emerging from the bedroom.  “Do you have to start the day with an argument?”

“It ain’t me crowing like the dickens,” he protested.  “I’d keep my thoughts to myself if I sounded like that.  You’d think God would’ve made the rooster’s voice a little more pleasant if he wanted folks to wake up in a good mood.”

His mother smiled despite herself, and leaned hard on the pump handle beside the kitchen sink, propping the pail close to keep it from splashing.  “Only you would have such creative thoughts when there’s cows to milk and eggs to gather.  Don’t forget to check to make sure that fox hasn’t burrowed under the fence again.  I’m not losing one more pullet to his wiles.”

The fence was intact, which Stiles thought might be as much due to Elliott and Barnaby making such a ruckus as anything else.  The two roosters had divided up the barnyard between them, and when he watched them strutting and scraping in the dirt, Stiles couldn’t help but think of two pompous English noblemen, wearing their finery and talking like there wasn’t anything more important than who owned what piece of land.  He grinned, watching Barnaby comb his green head-feathers and shake his wattle. 

“Well, I swan, you think this is your farm too,” he remarked to the rooster, lifting the heavy wooden latch on the barn door.  “Like your name was on the deed.  Mrs. Stilinski and Son -- and Barnaby.”

The cows were glad to see him, it was true, and he could count on that, but he knew it was only because he took their milk and made them comfortable. Stiles was only as valuable as he was useful; he had no illusions about that.  He really did do his best to run the farm the way he thought his father would have wanted. It was just so _easy_ to get distracted.  There were so many things in the world that weren’t within a stone’s throw of the Stilinski farm.  Was it surprising, then, that he often found himself going looking for them?

Harriet and Ebenezer reported his mother’s arrival before he could hear her himself, whickering and shuffling in their stalls.  Stiles didn’t bother to look up from the milking. 

“You ain’t gonna get the horses to work harder by feeding them crabapples, Mother,” he said.

“I don’t feed them to make them work harder,” she replied, her skirts rustling as she stepped carefully across the straw-strewn floor.  “I do it because it’s kind.  The world is short on kindness these days.”

There was no doubt in Stiles’ mind that when it came to kindness, Claudia Stilinski could match every woman or man east of the Potomac.  He wasn’t vying for such a title himself, and he guessed nobody would have expected it of him.  He was the cheeky one, and she was the nice one, and that was fine.

“I aim to get the rest of the potatoes and beets out of the ground this morning,” he said casually, “and then I’m meeting Heather for early dinner.”

It was a credit to her character that his mother didn’t reprimand him about spending time with a married woman, as most folks would have.  He knew he wasn’t doing their family’s reputation any good by carrying on with Heather, as though they were still youths splashing in Hardpan Creek, pretending to be pioneers.  Stiles knew Heather cared about reputation more than he did, but thankfully not enough to stop meeting with him for lunch. 

“I’ll wrap a loaf of johnny-cake for the two of you to share,” was all his mother said. 

The horses and cows turned out to pasture, the sheep rounded up -- Stiles hadn’t had a sheep dog since their last one got foot-rot and died three years back, and honestly, he’d never seen much need for another dog -- and his breakfast et, he was able to get a good chunk of his harvesting done before the dew was even dry on the field.  He had energy to spare, it was true, sometimes more than he knew what to do with.  “Better not to court trouble,” his father had said often to Stiles when he was a boy, which to him meant _keep busy._   To Stiles, it meant _don’t get caught._   Luckily, he’d had cartloads of experience at both of those things. 

“Will you ask after the state of Heather’s grandfather for me?” his mother asked when Stiles returned to the house to wash his face and collect the johnny-cake.  “His health was still poor the last I heard, and I wouldn’t want to miss important news.”

He swiped a crabapple from the bowl on the table.  “Sure thing.  I’ll be back for afternoon milking.”

Stiles could probably have taken the walk across Reunion Hill to Heather’s farm in his sleep. The fields between their farms changed with the season, but the brush and trees surrounding them were a frame that remained the same, year after year.  Since the war had ended, and once Heather’s parents had moved into town after Isaac and Heather were married and took over the farm, the only people who tramped through those fields anymore were Stiles and Heather.  Isaac was a good neighbor, but he had no interest in his wife’s childhood memories. 

Stiles hopped the fence, resting a hand on the third-largest beech, and paused to steady his breath.  Sometimes it felt like he wasn’t even alive anymore except when he was here, on his own land, remembering.  _The men, gathered in clumps of four and five, checking their rifles, tense and ready.  The sound of the officers, giving terse orders to assemble and fall out, and hundreds of trudging feet, walking across the hill north toward Burkittsville.  The silence they left behind, and the trinkets._ He still found them sometimes, concealed in the tall grass, tangled under each year’s piled leaves: a pair of spectacles, a compass, a shaving brush.  He had an assortment of the most interesting ones lined up under the eaves of his loft, hidden where his mother would never find them. 

The hill rose sharply up from the bank by the creek.  There was enough cover that it was easy, if he walked carefully through the underbrush, to sneak up on Heather as she waited on the ridge on the other side.  Stiles circled around behind her, watching her head droop in the sun, hidden under her bonnet.  Finally he scooped up a handful of pine cones and tossed one overhand, arcing lazily through the air to connect with her back. 

“You little beast!” she protested, but she was laughing, as he knew she would.  “It isn’t even noon and you’re already full of the dickens.”

“When am I not?” he grinned, dropping the remaining cones and depositing himself on the rock beside her.  She’d spread out her skirt so it covered her legs, her feet barely peeking out from underneath.  Stiles decided it wouldn’t be decorous of him to comment on how pretty she looked. 

 _She belongs to another man now,_ he imagined people would say. _You lost your chance with her._   He would respond that he’d never had a claim on her before she was married, and that nothing had really changed between them.  He could have said, too, how he knew something about belonging to someone else, but that was a tale only Heather knew, and he’d never tell it to another soul.

She smiled playfully.  “Well, then, perhaps I shouldn’t bother to show you what I found on the way over here this morning.”

“Perhaps I should eat all this johnny-cake myself,” Stiles countered, opening his jaw wide as though to take the entire bundle, cloth and string and all, into his gullet.  She laughed, pulling at his arm, and he relented, letting her open the package and divide the corn-flour pan bread into two even portions.  She had a handkerchief full of blackberries to share, only a little overripe, along with a piece of cheese and a jug full of good, cold water. 

Beside them on the rock, Heather placed something that glittered.  Stiles reached out to pick it up, but she covered it with her hand. 

“It’s not his,” she said, looking at him with apology in her eyes.  As though it was her fault that her father had returned from the war and his father hadn’t. As though she could have done anything about it, at all. 

“It’s all right.”  He waited for her to move her hand, and when he did, he could feel the smooth curve of metal under his fingers.  Stiles picked it up and held it to the light.  A ring, beautifully wrought.  He felt a wrench in his gut, but gave her what he hoped was an acceptably approving smile. “Nice.”

“You keep that one,” Heather said, talking through her mouthful of johnny-cake.  He was almost certain she never would have done _that_ in front of anyone else, particularly not her fastidious husband.  “I took the last things we found, the tinder-box and the fourpence.”

“Thanks.”  Stiles slipped it into his pocket.  He was conscious of its weight all through dinner -- it, and that of the other ring, the one that remained strung safely on a string around his neck, tucked under his shirt. 

Even with the ring serving as a distraction, he remembered to ask about her grandfather, who was fine, and listened to Heather chatter about the most recent round of sheep who’d turned up slaughtered along the south-east border of her farm.  He made appropriate _mmm_ -ing noises, hoping she wouldn’t call him on his obvious twitchiness. 

“Isaac’s father thinks the kills happen too regular to be blamed on wolves,” she said, gathering up the paper from the cheese.  “But my aunt says wolves can be fearsome smart.”

Stiles let out a loud and probably rude snort.  “Your aunt reckons she knows something about everything, no matter how inconsequential.  She’s the one who decided I’d been cursed by the Devil when it t’weren’t anything but a nasty little ground hornet in my trousers.”

“ _Stiles,_ ” Heather hissed, nudging his shoulder with the flat of her hand, smiling.  “Your language.  Let a lady keep her delicate sensibilities intact.” 

He hooted with laughter.  “I know exactly what kind of a _lady_ you are, Heather, and there isn’t anything _delicate_ about you.”

Her smile remained, tugging at the corners of her mouth.  “You might need to qualify that statement.  I might be described to be that, by some, for a goodly period of time.  Months.  Nine of them, to be exact.”

Stiles didn’t make the connection for another minute and a half.  When he finally realized what she was talking about, he leapt up from the rock, scattering cake crumbs all over Heather’s skirt. 

“What?” he yelped.  “You’re not -- I mean, you _can’t_ be --”

“Stiles,” she said again, more calmly now.  “You can’t really be all that surprised.  I’ve been married for three years.”

He settled down beside her feet on the soft, old carpet of leaves and pine needles, staring up at her as he took her hands. “I don’t really have any basis for comparison.  Just -- for the love of God, Heather!  A _baby?_ ”

She sniffed.  “The least you can say is _congratulations._   I haven’t even told my own mother yet.”

Stiles knew that wasn’t saying much, considering what a delightful bitch Heather’s mother was most of the time, but he hugged her tight around the ribs -- quickly, then let her go before she could start to feel strange about it.  “I’m not even sure _what_ to say.  You, a mother?  Feels like we’ve hardly stopped being children ourselves."

“I’d say twenty-six is a grand sight older than a child.”  She touched his shirt, brushing off crumbs.  “We’ve passed too many milestones for it to be anything but thus.  Look at us, Stiles.  I’m Mrs. Lahey, and you’re Mr. --”

“Don’t say it,” he bit out sharply.  She paused, staring down at him in astonishment.  “Really, I can’t -- I can’t hear that name and have it be _me._ Not from you.”

Her brow furrowed.  “Why?”  She lay a hand on his sleeve.  “Because you want me to go on believing he’s still alive?  Or because I know things I shouldn’t about you?”

Stiles grimaced, turning away.  He wasn’t sure what was more shameful: that underneath his denim and workcloth and muscled body, he was nothing but a dang Mary boy... or that in ten years, he hadn’t tried once to deny it to himself. 

“I never asked you to pretend he was alive,” he said instead.  “You’re far too rational to swallow that kind of a whopper.”  He bent, gathering up the wrapper from the johnny-cake.  “I’m going to stay up here a little longer.  You’d better get home.  Wouldn’t want your mother to worry about us doing anything indiscreet.”

Heather’s smile was thin, but she backed off, leaving him to his own worries.  She knew Stiles well enough to know when he got like this, all he was going to do was bite back, like a hungry dog pushed into a bad temper.  “As you wish.  I’ll plan on seeing you at church this Sunday, then?” 

“You bet,” he muttered, running a hand through his hair.  All he wanted at that moment was to get out of the shade and into the sun.

Stiles didn’t bother to attempt stealth now, crashing through the underbrush and pushing through tangles of brambles and lines of beech and cedar that hemmed in the field to the west, making his way toward Indian Boulder. The crest of the ridge led him over and down a shallow slope to the improbably large stone, resting in the curve of Reunion Hill.  It was the shape of the boulder that gave it its name, not any kind of event that might or might not have taken place there -- from the side, it was the spitting image of the face of an Indian in profile -- but it had certainly been the setting of many childhood dramatic plays about a fictional Powhatan brave.  Heather had never minded being his fearless companion.  Stiles sometimes wished they had taken the time to write them all down.  They were the kind of stories he would have liked to pass on to Heather’s children. 

 _Considering you ain’t likely to have none,_ he thought bitterly, scaling the boulder with long practiced leaps and brief, well-placed handholds.  In seconds, he was atop it, gazing out over his family’s land to the west, and Heather’s -- the _Lahey’s_ \-- to the east.  He let his hands, suddenly clenched into fists, drop to his side, and sighed.  _Forget it.  You’re doomed to be Uncle Stilinski forever, and whoever said that was a bad thing to be, anyway?_

It didn’t feel so good, neither, but he sat down on the rock right where he was, letting himself give in to the unseemly tears that crept up on him frequently at this time of year.  It was as private as a graveyard up here, and no one but the birds of prey who circled the crest of the hill would hear him weep for sentimental memories and opportunities lost. 

The afternoon was warm, though, and the surface of the boulder warmer.  Once the tears had passed, Stiles couldn’t resist putting his cheek down against it, feeling its reliable strength, and closing his eyes long enough to remember.

* * *

 ** _Ten years ago, August 1862_**  

Stiles knew, even without eavesdropping on his father -- although did that, too, sometimes -- that the Union forces weren’t doing well.  He’d heard Heather’s father talking to the clerk at the post office about how Major General McClellan had failed to capture Richmond in the July advance, and everybody knew General Pope’s armies had all been destroyed at Manassas.  But most of Stiles’ news came from the soldiers themselves. 

Stiles had seen them more frequently over the past several week, limping back through the neighbor’s fields in groups of three and four, returning to Washington.  He was there with his mother, most days that his father didn’t need him, giving the wounded soldiers bread and soup and water -- along with whiskey to those with more grievous wounds -- while watching and listening and probably talking more than a boy of sixteen should. 

“You should be glad your son’s too young to fight,” one soldier told his mother, his face as bitter and stony as a piece of the granite ridge beside their farm. “We ain’t doing so well.  The way things are going, it’ll be a short autumn campaign.”

Unlike most of his friends, Stiles hadn’t wanted to go to war.  The idea of dying on a battlefield, before he became a man, before he’d had a chance to do so many things -- and there truly were so, so many -- seemed indescribably cheap and useless.  Luckily, he wasn’t quite tactless enough to say that in front of the soldiers.  He just nodded and kept his tongue as they grumbled and moaned about what it had been like to engage in combat, and felt blessed to be home with his father and mother. 

Stiles’ father had kept quiet through the stages of recruitment to the war.  He’d said publicly that he didn’t need thirteen stinking government dollars a month to get shot at, but Stiles knew that wasn’t true, that their farm could have sorely used that additional income.  His father wasn’t particularly religious, not compared to his mother, and whatever he believed God thought about the war, he kept to himself.  Stiles guessed his reluctance to enlist had more to do with their family and Stiles’ mother than anything else, but this, too, his father refrained from mentioning, and Stiles wasn’t going to press him for details. 

And then one afternoon in late August, after he’d finished the evening milking and the pigs had been slopped, and he’d rounded up the chickens into their coop for the night, Stiles arrived at home to find his mother briskly setting the table for eight. He paused in the kitchen, eyeing his father in the parlor speaking to five unfamiliar men.  Judging by their uniforms, they weren’t privates.  

“What’s Father doing?” he murmured. 

“Being a gentleman.”  His mother handed him a bar of soap, and he went to the pump in the corner, rolling up his sleeves.  “Maybe a little bit of politicking.  The army has subsidies for farmers who host soldiers, coming through on their way home.”

Stiles hadn’t known that, but it made sense, and maybe explained the presence of so many soldiers on their land that summer.  He strained to hear his father’s conversation while he lathered his filthy hands to the wrists.  “They talking about Manassas?”

“It’s not my place to listen, Stiles,” she said mildly.  She passed him a clean rag to dry his hands, then exchanged it for a handful of polished silver from the sideboard.  “Forks on the left, small spoon between the knife and big spoon.”

Stiles contained his derisive snort.  As though a Union commander would care where his fork sat, after being on the battlefield for the past five months.  He laid the silver carefully on the napkins, though, and his mother’s smile of approval made him feel good regardless. She poured coffee into their good china and set the cups on each plate setting except Stiles’ -- he still hadn’t developed a taste for coffee -- along with large slices of fresh, warm bread.  Stiles hovered by the bread basket, hovering hopefully, until she sighed. 

“One,” she said, and he grabbed the biggest piece.  It didn’t even need butter, not when when it was fresh like that. 

He munched, loitering just outside the parlor, listening to his father make conversation with the soldiers.  He heard the words “discouragement,” and “Maryland invasion,” and “brigadier-general.”  The young, dark-haired officer across from his father frowned.

“I don’t see how that’s relevant, sir,” he said. 

“Lincoln and McClellan don’t get along,” said the older man with the handlebar moustache.  “He’s bringing in Halleck, from the western theater, to replace him.”

“He ain’t no leader, Halleck,” said the heavyset man beside him.  “Ain’t got the strategy, ain’t got the rapport with the troops. The Union needs real commanders if it’s going to recover from its losses.”

“They’re shipping in men from the West by railroad, too,” the dark-haired one said.  His eyes flashed at Stiles’ father.  “Don’t underestimate the importance of fresh troops, particularly in regard to morale.  We’re seeing hundreds of men deserting, every day.”  He had a cultured accent, one that was unfamiliar to Stiles, but then every man who came through their fields had a slightly funny way of talking to his ear. 

Stiles’ father nodded slowly, gripping his pipe in his hand.  “It’s not an easy decision, Major.  I suspect it’s going to require some sustenance.”  He raised his voice.  “Claudia, are you ready for the invasion on your home territory?”

“I’ll rely on the brigadier-general and his men to be gentlemen on this terrain,” she called back, smiling.  Stiles felt a flush of admiration for his mother.  No matter how many dirty feet tramped through her clean house each week, she never quarreled with his father on matters regarding the war.

Stiles’ father paused in the doorway to meet Stiles’ gaze.  “I’ve relied on you today to take care of the livestock,” he said quietly.  “Need I remind you about any task?”

“No, father,” Stiles said.  It was a more sober response than he normally would have given.  Part of him wanted to put his best foot forward in front of these impressive men, but mostly he didn’t want to cause his father any further stress.  It was clear he was wrangling with some issue or another, his neck tense and his jaw set, even though his demeanor was genial. 

“Thank you.”  His father smiled then, and Stiles smiled back, startled.  The expression wasn’t a common one on his father’s face.  “I suspect I don’t need to remind you to leave the biggest portion of dinner for our guests, either?”

“I’ll do my durndest,” Stiles vowed, grinning.  “If mother don’t mind me cleaning my plate with an extra slice of her bread.”

As it turned out, none of them were all that concerned about table manners, although the dark-haired major, whose name was Hale, seemed to have some awareness of which fork to use.  He didn’t put his elbows on the table, either, and he said “please” and “thank you” like he’d been taught to eat properly.  Stiles guessed officers might come from fancier roots than most Maryland farmers, which could explain it, but he still wasn’t sure what to make of Major Hale. 

The cryptic conversation about the war continued through dinner, some of which Stiles followed and some which he tuned out in favor of focusing on his mother’s roast pig and baked apples.  The soldiers, however, didn’t seem to require a choice of one over the other. 

“Lee’s marshalling his men east of the Blue Ridge,” the heavyset officer said with his mouth full.  “They’ll be moving over the Potomac to Frederick as fast as they can push us, but they’ve had as hard a time as we have with rations.  They’re sick; they’re tired.  I think the Union forces can take them.  We need to be ready.”

They all seemed to be watching Stiles’ father as they ate, but as the heavyset officer spoke, the old man with the handlebar moustache put down his fork and gave him a nod.  “I’m going to need a decision, Colonel.”

Stiles wasn’t sure what they meant, which one was the colonel.  But it was his father who glared at the one with the moustache, and his mother who sighed, watching Stiles anxiously.  Stiles finally cleared his throat.

 _“Colonel?”_ he repeated. 

His father flinched, but didn’t look away from the moustached man. 

“I can’t say it more plain than this, sir,” said Hale, straightening his back.  “We need your leadership.  I hope you know we wouldn’t ask if it weren’t dire.  This could be the turning point.”

Stiles’ father’s jaw worked, and he flexed his fingers on the edge of the table.  He looked like he might be deciding between standing up and yelling, which would not be out of character, and bolting from the room, which would.  The worst part was, Stiles couldn’t tell which impulse was winning.

His mother appeared to be remaining calm, but it was clearly costing her something.  Stiles wished he was sitting close enough to her to take her hand, though whether it would have been to steady her or himself, he couldn’t say for certain. 

“Men,” he said, “I won’t have you holding this dinner hostage with your questions.  My good wife asked for the lot of you to be gentlemen, and you’re going to follow that request. Understood?”

There was a general murmuring of assent, and the heavyset officer even added a sheepish, “Begging your pardon, ma’am.”

“Not at all,” she replied smoothly, rising from the table.  “May I offer anyone a piece of blackberry pie?”

Stiles followed his mother into the kitchen, carrying dishes without being asked, mostly because he couldn’t abide being in the room with those _strangers,_ all of whom seemed to know something about his father that he didn’t.  His mother’s mouth was a thin line, and when he moved in close enough to speak to her without anyone in the other room hearing, she gave one short shake of her head. 

It was enough to force him to hold his damned tongue, but when he tried his mother’s pie it tasted no better than old potatoes.  When he asked to be excused from the table, his father dismissed him without looking at him. 

It was warm enough that Stiles didn’t need a coat, which was good, because he was almost certain he wouldn’t be going back to his house tonight.  There was room in the stable, but Stiles wasn’t ready to be inside yet.  He headed straight through the cornfield toward Indian Boulder.

The moon was high, but Stiles didn’t need it to find his way there.  The relationship between the field, the trees and the hill were as much a part of him as anything on the earth.  Tonight, however, he felt like he wasn’t sure what he could count on feeling familiar.  Too much had been shoved out of place.  He knew it wasn’t the time for him to ask questions, not yet, but he wasn’t sure what _else_ to do with his fool self in the meantime, other than sit on the rock in the moonlight and swat mosquitoes away until his overactive mind grew too tired to do anything but sleep. 

Stiles wasn’t there for more than ten minutes before he became aware of another presence nearby.  It startled him, because he hadn’t heard anyone else approaching, and there was no easy way to get to Indian Boulder without stepping on something crunchy or crackly in the underbrush, especially this late in the summer.  He felt a prickle all across the skin of his neck and arms, a shiver of gooseflesh in the warm evening. 

“Who goes there?” he called, his voice cracking.  It almost never did that anymore, except to tell on him when he was most anxious.

The figure emerged over the nose of the rock, still moving silently.  Stiles was doubly startled to see it was Major Hale. 

“You’re not used to seeing others here,” he said.  Hale’s voice was low and somewhat hoarse, as though he’d been shouting recently.

Stiles wasn’t sure how to respond to that.  He shook his head.  Hale approached him carefully, watching him out of the corner of his eye, in the same way that Stiles himself would sidle up to Ebenezer when the stallion was feeling ornery. 

“I come out here to be by myself,” said Stiles.  “To think.  It’s... I have time, here.”

It came out awkwardly, but Hale didn’t seem to think it was, or if he did, he didn’t say.  He simply nodded, crouching down on his heels beside Stiles, elbows balanced on his knees. 

“May I join you?” he asked politely.

Again, Stiles was startled, but he nodded, and Hale shifted to sit on the rock beside him, looking more comfortable than Stiles would have expected an officer of the United States Army to look in the middle of someone’s family’s farm.  Hale just watched the night sky, seeming content to sit without talking.  It made Stiles feel restless.  He cast about for something to say.

“Until dinner, I’d thought you and the other officers had come to recruit my father into the Union army.”

Hale’s lip twitched.  He glanced down at his lap.  “Not precisely.”

“You called him Colonel.”  Stiles watched Hale’s face.  “But my father’s never served in uniform.”

“You’re mistaken.”  Hale met his eyes.  Stiles was arrested by the intensity of his gaze, and he just stared back, more curious than confused.  “He was promoted to lieutenant colonel in the year 1851, after which he resigned his commission.”

Eleven years before.  Stiles grasped for memories of his five-year-old self, and the place they’d lived before moving to Maryland and purchasing the farm.  “He... was gone often,” he said slowly.  “When we were in Hampton.  My mother, she...”  He shook his head, feeling muddled.

Hale nodded encouragingly.  He sat forward, close enough now to brush Stiles’s shoulder with the sleeve of his jacket.  “My understanding is that he made a decision to choose his family over his country.  An honorable choice, and one many men have made before.”  His gaze sharpened.  Stiles felt himself losing control of his senses, as though, with each moment, Hale’s penetrating stare was leaching his will from him.  “Brigadier-General Wool’s decision to come here, to the Lieutenant Colonel’s house, speaks to the Army’s need for leaders.  He wouldn’t be asking if it weren’t crucial.  Your father... he was a great man.”

“My father _is_ a great man,” Stiles snapped.  Hale’s head jerked back, his eyes widening.  “I don’t need to know his rank to tell me that about him.  And he’ll go on being a great man long after you sons of bitches leave.”

“Stiles,” Hale said.  His voice was quiet, full of grave regret, but also determination.  Stiles couldn’t bear to hear Major Hale’s voice saying his name that way.  He thrust out a hand to to scramble to his feet, but when Hale intercepted him, he slipped and fell back to the rock again.  Hale was there, using his body to shield Stiles from the collision with the boulder, clutching him safely to his chest.

“Let me go!” Stiles cried, struggling, but it was like trying to get out from under the press of a wagonload of sand.  “Damn you, let me go or I’ll --”

“Stiles,” Hale said again, with more force, and Stiles felt himself collapse, folding in on himself as though he were no more substantial than a piece of paper.  The sound that came out of his mouth wasn’t another curse, nor an accusation, but a sob, followed by another and another, too numerous and overwhelming to avoid. 

Stiles thought vaguely that he should have been horrified to be weeping like an infant in front of this stranger. Hale was a major in the United States Army, and he knew Stiles’ father history better than Stiles did -- and, all right, perhaps his eyes did strange and inexplicable things to Stiles’ insides -- but at the moment, Stiles felt more grateful than embarrassed at the support of Hale’s arms.  Stiles dug his forehead into Hale’s chest and raged for several long minutes, and Hale just held him tighter, warm and silent and strong.

By the time his tears had waned, however, Stiles’ entire body was pressed up against Hale’s, from neck to groin.  And Stiles was -- Stiles had --

“Begging your pardon,” he whispered, feeling the embarrassment crest and overwhelm the gratitude. 

But Hale remained holding him, not moving away.  He was watching Stiles with the most indescribable expression.  It did not appear to be anything like fear or disgust or even disappointment, but rather held the light of understanding.  Stiles sat there in Hale’s arms, experiencing for the first time the embrace of a man other than his father, and considered his body’s traitorous response.  And Hale...

“Well,” breathed Hale, the word landing on his face like a gentle slap.  Stiles twisted away, whimpering. 

“Major Hale,” he began, but Hale put a palm on his chest, resting it there, effectively sandwiching Stiles between his two hands. 

“Derek." 

Stiles was paying more attention to Hale’s hands than his words.  It was becoming increasingly hard to think about anything other than wrapping his limbs around Hale’s.  Some part of Stiles wondered how he _could_ be wanting such a thing, but that part was effectively silenced by the trembling awareness in his core. It had no rational thoughts, but wished for nothing more than to find a rhythm against Hale’s firm thigh.  He blew out a breath.  “I -- what?”

“I’m Derek.”  Hale shifted the hand behind Stiles’ back, loosening his hold, as though by declaring his name, he was putting the walls back where they should have been.  Stiles straightened up, his skin prickling with the loss of contact. 

“Stiles,” he muttered.  “Just Stiles.  No one uses my given name, less’n they want a whipping.”

Hale’s -- _Derek’s_ \-- hands were off him now, and that made Stiles even more uncomfortable, feeling the situation those hands had wrought in him, both in body and in soul.  Stiles crossed his arms over his chest, thinking he should leave -- and reluctant to be the one to go.  _Derek should leave,_ he thought stubbornly.  _After all, this is my land, my farm_. 

“Stiles,” Derek said a third time.  This time, he was holding the _name_ in his hands, on his lips.  Stiles found himself watching Derek’s lips, wondering when in tarnation all these parts of another man’s body had gotten so jo-fired interesting.

 _You’re doing something to me._   It was another admission one didn’t make to a stranger, even if it had to be obvious to Derek that yes, he was.  Even more, it was confounding to Stiles that _Derek_ was responding, too. 

“Why didn’t he tell me?” he said instead.

Derek looked away.  “Only your father can tell you that for certain.  Suffice it to say there are reasons to keep secrets.  Surely you have lived enough years to understand that.”  He glanced sideways at Stiles. 

“I’ve never had a secret to keep before,” Stiles said.  He watched Derek blink.

“Never?” Derek said.  Stiles shook his head.  Now Derek looked completely off-balance.  He paused, then rose to his feet, heading for the edge of the boulder.  “I should be on my way...”

“Please,” Stiles called.  It was a good thing Derek stopped, or else Stiles was pretty sure he would have started crying again.  “I can’t... I don’t want you to go.  Just... stay.  Please.”

Derek’s hands clenched into fists.  Stiles kept his eyes on the tendons in Derek’s neck above his collar, the way they twisted and coiled, like an animal ready to spring.  He realized suddenly that he wanted to put his mouth on those tendons, to feel their taut strength.  He should have been appalled at himself, but the adrenaline rushing through him was driving him to more extreme possibilities than that. 

He thought, with a horrifying rush of awareness, _this... this must be what soldiers feel when they’re at war._

Stiles walked to stand behind Derek, resting his hands on his broad back, and reveled in the noise Derek made, throaty and broken.  He breathed it in.  Derek’s response was the sustenance he’d never known he’d needed before that moment, and he wanted more.

“I don’t know why I want it,” he said, “but I do.  And don’t tell me I’m too young, because --”

“No,” Derek said, the word barely a sigh.  He turned his head slightly, far enough for Stiles to see the curve of his cheekbone.  “No, I won’t tell you that.  I’m only guessing at your age, but I remember all too well how it was for me when I was a youth. To want a thing you’d been told a man... shouldn’t want.”

“But you do,” Stiles whispered, like a plea. _“You_ do.”

Derek turned around the rest of the way, facing him.  Stiles dropped his hands, returning them to his sides, but Derek reached for them, making Stiles shiver and shrink back.

“I know what I am,” he said.  “I’m not like ordinary men.”

“Neither am I,” Stiles countered.  He’d never been more certain of that before this moment.  He had perhaps had inklings of this tendency, but now that Derek’s hands had awakened him, it was not even a question.

“No.”  Derek reached up and brushed Stiles’ cheek with the back of one hand. That was almost a smile on his face.  Stiles felt dizzy.  “No, I mean... I’m under a curse.  Me, my sister, my whole family.”

Stiles licked his lips.  He could tell Derek was not talking about the strange and wonderful attraction between them.  That this curse, whatever it was, was something else.  “Oh.”

“We all have it.”  Derek’s eyes were hooded.  “It makes us stronger, faster.  We become... monsters.  It makes us very effective soldiers, but... it’s not pretty.”

 _Pretty._   It was not a suitable word for a man as rugged and manly as Derek Hale, but Stiles would not have denied Derek’s face was, in many ways, the prettiest he’d ever seen.  He mirrored Derek’s action, touching his face with tentative fingertips, and watched him react with rising anticipation.

“What happens?” Stiles asked. 

Derek grasped Stiles’ hand in his, and pressed it to his mouth, kissing the wrist as he watched Stiles’ face.  Now Stiles was the one to respond with an involuntary groan. 

“The demon takes over.”  Derek’s voice was low with regret and other things that Stiles could barely guess at.  “Trust me, you don’t want to see.” 

Stiles shook his head.  “I don’t care.”

For a long moment, Derek gazed into Stiles’ face, his fingers gently carding through Stiles’ hair.  It was waking up all the skin on his neck, a sensation that slowly spread to the rest of his body.  He closed his eyes, letting himself feel, just to _feel_ the touch of another man, and to appreciate exactly how much that meant to him.

When he opened them again, Derek was smiling.  “Extraordinary,” he murmured, tracing the curve of Stiles’ ear.  “I believe you actually mean that.”

Stiles nodded wordlessly.  Derek’s contact was putting him into a kind of stupor from which he was having a hard time recovering.  At the same time, he recognized that the things he wanted most were things he shouldn’t be asking for -- not from any man, but especially not from an important man like Major Hale.  The very thought made him stagger. 

“I think,” Stiles said, trying to put words into sentences, “people will be looking for you pretty soon.”

“Stiles,” Derek said.  It was the fourth time he’d said his name, and this one was perhaps the hardest to hear of all, because it held promises, and Stiles wanted more than _anything_ to hear them.  But Derek just stepped back with a sigh, nodding.  “I don’t -- I’m not here to ask anything of you.”

Stiles laughed.  “Oh, trust me, there ain’t nothing you could ask of me right now that I don’t want to give you.  I just don’t have any clue about how to do that.”

Derek’s stunned expression made Stiles laugh harder.  He shrugged helplessly while Derek retreated toward the edge of the boulder.

“There are others, like us,” Derek said.  “You’re not alone.  Now that you know what you’re looking for, you’ll have an easier time of it, finding those who want... the things you want.”

 _What I want is standing right before me,_ he wanted to say.  He wanted to put his hands back on Derek’s face and never stop touching him.  He wanted to feel more of that skin, the way Derek’s fingers were waking him up.  He wanted to taste him, the sweat of him, to bury his nose into Derek’s neck and inhale his scent.  But he didn’t dare do any of those things.

“All right,” he said. 

Derek gave a firm nod, then turned and stepped off the edge of the rock.  It wasn’t a short fall to the ridge below, but as Stiles scrambled down after him, he could see that Derek was walking away as though he’d just done something as simple as leap across two stepping stones in Hardpan Creek. 

“Hey,” he called.  Derek paused, turning to look at him, and Stiles hurried to catch up.  He took a deep breath and reached out a hand, resting it on Derek’s arm.  “Thank you.  For telling me the truth.”

He didn’t specify which truth in particular, but Derek’s nod seemed to cover all of them.  “You’re very welcome, Stiles.”

Derek didn’t appear to need any help finding his way back in the dark.  Stiles walked with him anyway, asking him all the ordinary questions while they walked, about his family (two sisters and a mother living in Vermont, and an an uncle serving in the Navy), how he’d grown up (raised by his mother, traveling between Britain and the United States), his journey from commissioned lieutenant to major (quick and dirty, because, as Derek said, “They needed officers like they needed rations”).  He didn’t actually pay much attention to the content of what Derek said, just as long as he was able to walk beside him and listen to him talk, and occasionally bump against him with his shoulder as they went. 

The ordinary questions distracted Stiles from asking the things he _really_ wanted to know, like _when did you discover you lusted after men this way, the way men are supposed to lust after women?_

The closer they drew to the house, however, the quieter Derek got.  When, too soon, they spied the light shining out of the front window, Derek stopped walking and stared at the farm, scowling.  Stiles couldn’t decide if that expression was distressing or captivating. 

“What’s troubling you?” he asked.

“This.”  Derek gestured at the fence, where Barnaby was perched, for once placid and drowsy.  Stiles tilted his head at the rooster.

“Well, he’s ornery and brash as all get out, but I don’t think Barnaby’s gonna do anything --”

“ _This,”_ Derek repeated impatiently, grabbing Stiles’ shoulder and cutting off his words with a firm shake.  “Stiles... _this_ stops here.  Nothing is going to come of -- what happened on the rock.  Do you understand?”

Stiles felt all the motion in his body slow, like clockwork winding down, and grind to a halt, until he was left staring at Derek’s hand holding his shoulder.  That answered the question Stiles had been most afraid to ask: _are these simply the desires of the flesh, or is there more than that here?_

Because Stiles knew about lust.  He’d felt it wake in him almost daily for the past four years, knew how it could haunt his dreams and leave him wakeful in the middle of the night. And he had heard the hired hands talking about what coarse men did with women who let them.  This... didn’t feel like that.  It was true he’d no experience to teach him, but he knew rather a lot about trusting his heart.  And his heart was telling him something loud and clear and terrifying about Derek Hale. 

But now Derek was saying, in no uncertain terms, that it didn’t matter one donkey’s fart _what_ his heart was telling him, because Stiles wasn’t going to get what he wanted. 

Stiles did the only thing he could do: he nodded.  Then he broke away from Derek’s hand and made a beeline for the side door of the stable, ducking into the unoccupied stall beside Harriet, and crouched in the musty straw.  There, he waited for his heart to slow its wild, ragged rhythm. 

 _He’s just a man,_ he told himself, in the midst of a brutal spate of tears.  _There’s nothing here that matters.  He’s going to leave, and everything will be... the same again._

“Stiles?” he heard, and he sniffed, trying desperately to control his crying.  It obviously wasn’t Derek, unless Derek had suddenly learned how to modify his voice to sound like a middle-aged matron. 

“Here,” he called back.  A moment later, his mother appeared, peering over the stall door, lit by the lantern she carried.

“I wanted you to know there’s still room in the house, if you’d prefer to sleep there,” she said.  “The officers are settled on bedrolls on the floor in the loft, and I gave the brigadier-general your bed, but there is space for you in the kitchen.  In truth, I would not blame you one tiny bit if this suited you better tonight.”  She smiled wryly.  “I think I might prefer it, myself, if the house were not currently in such dire need of a female’s voice of reason.”

Stiles nodded again.  “Thank you, mother.”  He couldn’t tell her no, not when she’d been so kind to him.  He watched her sigh, though, and felt guilty anyway.  _For being myself.  For wanting something she can’t understand.  For resenting her for keeping the truth from me._

“It’s not only that,” she said.  “I imagine you have questions.  I’m here to answer as many as I can. Although perhaps tonight is not the best time.”

“Just...”  He fished for anything he could ask that would explain the situation to his satisfaction, anything at all.  “Father.  Why did he resign his commission?”  When she hesitated, eyes fixed on the table, he added hesitantly, “Was it -- was he... ashamed?”

“To be a soldier?”  She shook her head firmly.  “No.  Stiles, no.  It was me.  I insisted he put his family first.  He wanted to remain in the reserves, to maintain his promise to his country, but I would have none of it.  I was too anxious to return to my family’s farm here in Maryland and make a life for us.”  Even in the darkness of the barn, Stiles could see her face was tinged with regret.  “I was selfish.”

“Selfish?”

She inclined her head, like a prayer.  “When you’re just starting out together as man and wife... it hurts to be apart.  Even after six years of marriage, it was thus with your father.  His time away from us, drilling and training, felt like the biggest sacrifice I could be asked to make.  I didn’t yet understand what it meant to be a good wife, to be patient and to trust my husband to make the decisions that would care for his family.  All I could see was his absence, and not what I could make of it.”

Her words were soft, wistful, sounding not at all like his own practical mother.  Stiles didn’t remember a time when she had been so forthcoming with details about her own state.  It made him feel a little strange to hear her, but he was pleased, too, to be granted such an accord, as though he were himself an adult. 

He struggled to remember significant details of his father from his early childhood, to no avail.  “He wasn’t there much.  When I was small.”

“He had his own duty to fulfill.”  His mother didn’t look away. “As he may choose to do again."

“Mother.”  He stared back.  “Father can’t go with the soldiers.”

“I have told him I won’t tell him no again.  It is his decision.  It has been all along.”

“But -- the farm!  How could he just leave that to --”  Stiles stopped, aghast.

Now her eyes flashed impatience.  “You’re nearly a man, Stiles.  And don’t tell me you underestimate my capacity to manage in his absence.  I’ve done it before.”

That wasn’t it, and she knew he knew it.  They were both capable of doing the practical things to keep the farm going, when his father was busy with other things.  No, it was the rush of icy fear at the idea of being expected to _grow up,_ just like that.

“ _I’m_ not ready,” he insisted.  “He wouldn’t choose that.  Not without talking to me first.”

“Stiles...”   His mother sounded weary.  “Your father’s concerns are larger than you, or this farm.  I’m saying you’d best _be_ ready for that possibility, with or without conversation from him.”  Her shadow flickered, long and distorted, on the wall of the barn as she turned.  “I won’t expect you back at the house until morning, but I’ll leave blankets for you in the kitchen if you change your mind.”

Stiles listened to the quiet shuffle of his mother’s steps through the straw, then the squeak of the door hinge, and then he was in darkness once more. 

Somehow this darkness seemed more ominous.  Perhaps it was because now Stiles knew what might come of the soldiers’ visit.  _What else might come of it,_ he amended, remembering Derek’s hand brushing his cheek.  It made him shiver.  The speed at which his world was changing was truly dizzying.  He felt like he’d been knocked around by a sound set of punches to the head; whilst he was reeling from one blow, the next was sneaking up on him from the opposite side. 

He gritted his teeth.  _Well, Stiles, you can either huddle up under cover of your own arms and try to withstand the assault like a scared little boy, or you can brace for the next round and get ready to fight back like a man._

It was a lonely place to be.  Not the barn; the barn felt safe and familiar, with Harriet stamping and whickering in the stall beside him, the mild smell of cow and straw and grain blanketing his abused senses.  No, it was lonely knowing that, whatever happened, he had no control over the outcome -- but would have to be responsible for it just the same.  There was no one to hold his hand and tell him it would be all right.  He would have to tell himself.

That was Stiles’ breaking point.  And because he was alone, he felt no compunction about indulging in a completely undignified, juvenile temper tantrum.  He didn’t kick the walls of the barn, nor yell, because that would scare the animals, but instead balled his fists by his ears and wound himself into a taut, seething mass on the floor of the stable.  He thought things no boy should think about his own father, not if his father had treated him with fairness and respect, as his always had.  He raged, as quietly as he could, at the utter injustice of the world, even as he rolled his own eyes at himself for doing so. 

When the hand touched his back, he supposed he should have been startled, but the truth of the matter was he’d been lying there with his hands cradling his head, letting the pain wash over him and wishing so desperately for someone, anyone to hear him.  The touch felt like an answer to his prayers, and he rolled into it, squeezing his eyes tight as the arms enfolded him. 

“I’m sorry,” Derek whispered, sounding penitent, “I’m so sorry, I couldn’t stay away, not when you were -- please, forgive me.”

“No,” Stiles replied immediately, interrupting him, “no, don’t tell me you’re sorry, just -- I can’t do this alone, I don’t know how.”

He felt rough, dry lips on his cheekbone, the corner of his mouth.  “You’re not alone.”

Derek’s kiss left him stunned, and Stiles heard himself whimper, turning his head blindly in the dark, seeking more.  The next kiss met his chin, and then his upper lip, and then his mouth, open and wanting.  The sound that came out of Derek was more animal than human. 

“I shouldn’t,” he said.

“Yes,” Stiles said vehemently, “yes, you should.  Please, I need --”

He needed _something,_ and not knowing what to do to get it was killing him a little bit.  He kissed Derek back, feeling the way in which their mouths fit together, and Derek’s hungry response.  It was a revelation, to know that lips touching could make a body feel like that, could reach down inside and yank up the floor on the world and upend it, like a basket of acorns.  He was scattered on the floor, and Derek was collecting him, one by one, and putting him back where he belonged.

“Come here,” Derek said, shifting Stiles off the floor and onto his knees, facing him.  His touches were tentative.  Stiles could tell how much he was holding back. 

“You’re not going to hurt me,” he insisted.  “I want it.”

It was too dark to see, but he could hear Derek’s frustration.  “You don’t know what I’m capable of.”

“Show me.”

Stiles was only vaguely aware of what he was asking for, but the voice inside him screaming for _more, now, please_ knew what he wanted, even if the rest of him didn’t have a sense in the world.  Derek’s lips moved to Stiles’ neck, kissing hungrily, then more aggressively.  He felt Derek’s arms tighten abruptly, and heard a low growl.

“Oh,” he whined, pressing in harder against Derek’s blunt teeth, “sweet merciful Jesus.”

“Stiles,” said a different voice.  It was still clearly Derek’s, but much harsher and more distorted than his ordinary one.  “Don’t be afraid.  I won’t hurt you.”

Stiles felt his own arms around Derek’s broad back, the way Derek was holding him, even as he shook and strained against him.  “I know,” he said.  “I know you won’t.”

“All right.”  Derek sat back, just far enough for Stiles to feel their breath between them.  “Touch my face.  Feel what I have become.”

It took him a few moments to decide it was still Derek’s face, because everything had changed.  There were ridges where a minute ago there had been smooth planes, and hair sprouted from every feature, not just along his jaw.  Stiles traced the exaggerated brow, the pointed ears.  When he brought his hand around to touch Derek’s lips, his fingers caught on sharp teeth.  It was another several moments before he could speak.

“My mother told me a story when I was a boy about a little girl in a cloak, going to her grandmother’s house, and along the way she met a -- an animal.”  He swallowed.  “A wolf.”

“Yes.”  Derek sounded bitter now.  “I am not unlike that animal.”

Stiles hesitated only briefly before touching his cheek to Derek’s.  Derek sucked in a breath.

“You are, though,” Stiles whispered.  “You’re not an animal.  You have nobility and compassion.  You’re a moral person.  No animal can exhibit such things.”

“I’m not thinking about any of those things, Stiles,” Derek said desperately.  He applied firm pressure to Stiles’ shoulder, until Stiles was flat on his back on the floor and Derek was kneeling over him.  “All I want to do is --”

“Is _what?”_ Stiles demanded. 

“To use you,” he snarled.  “To take your innocence from you.  To make you mine.  Tell me, is that not the act of an animal?”

“Animals mate to procreate,” Stiles said, as calmly and steadily as he could manage.  “I don’t believe that is your goal.  You’re not scaring me, do you hear?”  Whatever might be possible, he had no idea, but his desire was beyond rational thought.  

Another low growl rippled out of Derek, and lingered there behind his voice, like an echo.  “Oh, animals take pleasure from one another.  I have no doubt I could make you feel... things you’ve never felt before.”

“Yes,” he begged, and heard Derek mutter a curse.

“I _should not,”_ Derek said again, his voice pained, but he did not move his hands away.  “It’s irresponsible and selfish in the highest degree.  You deserve more than a toss in the hay, Stiles.”  Now his voice sounded normal again.  Stiles used his fingers to map Derek’s features a second time.  He felt only the familiar contours of a human face.  It was no more or less appealing to him than the monster had been.  “This is something I have no right to take.”

“Yes.  Yes, you do.”  He cupped Derek’s face in both hands and kissed him.  “Because you’re taking something that I’m giving you freely.  I’m giving you that right.”

***

Derek did not stray far from Stiles while he breathed, and although he left a cushion of air between their sweaty bodies, he did not seem to want to move his hand from Stiles’ chest, resting over his heart.  Stiles eventually moved his own hand atop Derek’s, holding it there, just to let him know that was okay, that that was exactly what he wanted.

He lay back on the straw, staring up at the ceiling, and eventually realized something else.  “You can see me?”

“In the dark.  Yes.” 

Stiles wasn’t sure that was exactly what he’d meant.  He tried again.  “And at other times?  You... _saw me_ , on Indian Boulder.  Before this.  Before I even knew what I wanted myself.  Could you tell, about me?”

Derek shook his head.  “I didn’t think about that when I came to you.  I just knew you were in pain, and I had to do what I could to help.”

“Why?”  Stiles turned toward him, wishing even more now that he could see Derek’s expression. 

Derek did not reply, but he leaned over and kissed Stiles, and that was all the invitation Stiles needed to eliminate the space between them.  Kissing Derek was still appealing, even now that the rutting drive had quieted, and they did that for some time before another question surfaced in Stiles’ brain. 

“Do you remember how the story ends?  The one about the wolf and the girl in the cloak?”

Derek let out a soft sigh. “In the version I have heard most frequently, the wolf consumes the girl, after which she is rescued by a passing woodsman who hears her cries.”

“What if she did not want to be rescued?”

He shifted.  “I doubt she would have had that choice --”

“What if, now that you have -- consumed me, I wish to remain inside you when you go?  To be part of you?  What would you say to that?”

Derek was silent for ten long heartbeats, though he did not move away, and Stiles did not think he was upset by the question.  Finally, he spoke.  “I would say first, you are a boy, and a boy needs his freedom.  I would not ask you to give that up.  And second, war takes its toll on a country, and civil war more than most.  I do not know if I will come back.”

The answer was honest and should have come as no surprise to Stiles, but in his mind’s eye, he could abruptly see his father as well as Derek, both so plainly, dropping on the battlefield to a bayonet or rifle fire.  He clutched at Derek’s back, and Derek gathered him up in his arms, as though Stiles weighed no more than a falling leaf. 

“I regret this, Stiles,” he said, with heavy sorrow.  “It is the truth.  This was as unexpected for me as it was for you.  I have lived my life unattached, because it was safer that way.  I had no intention of... my heart becoming involved.”

Stiles felt his own heart leap at the words, wiping his eyes.  “But now it is?”

He felt Derek’s nod against his cheek, and turned his face to kiss him again.  “I feel it is a weakness to admit such a thing, and yet I cannot deny it.”

“You said no man deserves to be owned by another without his consent.”  He rested his head on the curve of Derek’s shoulder.  “What if I would offer that consent?”

Derek paused.  “Stiles...”

“I know you cannot promise to return,” he went on insistently, “but neither can I see my life picking up and going on as it was after you depart.  My heart will follow you, whether you will it or no.”

It was Derek’s turn to grip Stiles hard, his nose pressed in against Stiles’ neck.  “Waking to desire is not the end of your journey, Stiles.  It is just the beginning for you.  Do not make of this a tragedy.”

“I didn’t say it was one.”  He intertwined his fingers with Derek’s and gripped them, hard.  “You’re leaving in the morning, and you’re probably taking my father with you, and -- and I’m still smiling.”

“And weeping,” Derek agreed.  “Smiling and weeping, both.  It is madness.”  He pulled Stiles astride his body, stretched out as though on a plank, holding him securely.  “I would not leave you until dawn.”

“I’d be much obliged,” Stiles murmured, closing his eyes.

Sleep ebbed and flowed through the night, claiming them both for brief periods, but Stiles found himself unable to keep his hands off Derek each time he woke.  Derek roused whenever Stiles touched him, with the habits of a soldier, and not one time did he object, not even when the grey light crept over them like a warning.

At dawn, Stiles listened to the cows knocking against the wall of the barn, and Barnaby beginning his morning serenade.  “I’m late for the milking.”

“You’ll be wanted by more than cattle soon.”  Derek sat up, and Stiles sat with him, watching as Derek recovered his shirt from the floor and pulled it on.  He reached out a tentative hand and touched Derek’s leg.

“I’m just touching you.  Just to be sure you’re real.”

Derek smiled.  It quite transformed his face, and Stiles found himself staring.  “Real, indeed.  Major Derek Hale, at your service.”

“Unbelievable.”  Stiles shook his head.  He moved his hand to Derek’s face, where Derek cupped his fingers against him.

“If you are in danger of believing yourself deluded by your memory,” Derek said, somewhat hesitantly, “perhaps I... should leave you with... a token.  Something to recall this night.”

“You think I’m going to forget?” Stiles scoffed.  Then his heart did a slow roll as he watched Derek grasp the gold ring on the smallest finger of his left hand, working it carefully over his knuckle.  When it was free, Derek took Stiles’ hand and deposited the ring into his palm, closing his fingers over it.

“It belonged to my mother’s mother.”

“Derek, I can’t take this,” he protested.  Derek went back to buttoning his shirt. 

“Consider it a loan, for safekeeping.  As I am holding your heart, until you are ready to have it back.”

Stiles had nothing to say in response.  He swallowed hard on the lump in his throat.  The ring fit loosely on his last finger, but he clutched it tight, not letting it slip over the knuckle as he gathered up his own clothes and pulled them on. 

It stayed there as he did the milking, but he knew he could not wear it on his hand in front of his father.  When Derek approached him from behind, placing both hands on Stiles’ shoulders as he perched on the milking stool, Stiles had decided on a solution.  He turned and handed the ring back to Derek, along with a piece of string. 

“Around my neck?” he said, looking up at him. 

Derek just nodded, threading the ring onto the string, and tied it securely before tucking it into Stiles’ shirt.  He left his hand there on Stiles’ chest for a few moments, touching the ring, cupping him in a brief embrace.  Then he let go and turned, heading for the door. 

Stiles scrambled to his feet, trying not to panic.  “You -- Derek?”

“We will depart when the brigadier-general is ready,” Derek said quietly.  “Not before.  But I do not think you and I will have another moment alone before I go.”

 _Now_ Stiles’ smile was gone.  All he felt was miserable, and the look on Derek’s face wasn’t much better.  Stiles couldn’t even bring himself to walk into Derek’s arms; he just waited there, his arms holding himself tight, until Derek came to him, stroking his shoulders lightly. 

“I won’t interfere between you and your father,” he added, “but you may want to give him a chance to explain.”

They were the last words Derek spoke to him.  Stiles never forgot them, any more than he forgot the gentle embrace that followed, so different from the passion of the night before.  He held on until Derek let him go, accepting his kisses and caresses with increasing resignation.

Stiles let Derek return to the house while he finished his morning chores, and by the time he followed him there, the officers were readying their horses for departure.  Stiles’ father was among them, wearing a uniform coat Stiles had certainly never seen before. They were joined shortly thereafter by several other local farmers, including Heather’s father, none of whom seemed surprised to see his father in uniform.  

“I’ll send word as soon as I can,” his father told his mother, tucking the package of food she handed him into his smallest saddlebag.  She nodded, her face drawn and quiet, and accepted a kiss before assisting in packing the rest of the officers’ gear on the back of their mule.

Stiles didn’t stay to watch them leave.  He fled to the ridge, standing at the base of Indian Boulder, watching the small company make their way across the valley until they had disappeared from view.  

It wasn’t that Stiles hadn’t wanted to say goodbye, nor to hear his father’s reasons for what he had done; he had.  It was that he didn’t think he could have tolerated a moment in Derek’s presence without his face plainly revealing what had happened the night before. 

He turned when he heard someone approaching, but was unsurprised to see Heather struggling through the scrub, joining him beside the rock, her face red and shiny with tears under her bonnet. 

“He told me about your father,” she said.  “Stiles, I’m so sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” he replied, and held out his hand to hold hers, like they were still ten years old.  She took it without a thought. 

It took him about two minutes to decide what to do next, mostly because Heather had always known him better than anyone else.  If there was any chance he was going to make it through the next few weeks, he was going to need a friend who knew what was going on. 

“I met someone,” he said. 

She rubbed her hand over her face and sniffed.  “Someone?” she repeated dully.

He cleared his throat.  “I gave... my heart.”

“Oh --”  Heather’s eyes flew open, one hand on her chest.  “Stiles!”

“You can’t tell anyone,” he cautioned her, as she reached for his other hand.  “It remains a secret, for as long as it needs to be.”

She stared up at him, nodding.  “How?  _Where?”_  

“Not here.”  He glanced up at the rock above them, realizing he was never going to be able to sit up there again without thinking about Derek.  “Come on, help me up.  I’ll tell you the whole story.”

* * *

**_Eleven months later, July 1863_ **

 “Six more today,” his mother called across the paddock.  Stiles paused in slopping the pigs, wiping the sweat from his neck with the cuff of his shirt, and squinted into the sun. 

“None stopping for dinner?” he called back. 

She shook her head.  “I sent them on their way once I’d spoken with them.  They didn’t look like they had a lick of tolerance in them for conversation, and when they spoke to one another, every other word was a curse.  I’d just as soon let them find another waystation.”

Stiles knew already what his mother was not saying: _none of them knew anything about your father._   She’d gotten very good at asking for information without prying.  No one had heard anything about Lieutenant Colonel Stilinski, or even seemed to know who he was.  Stiles did not have to ask if these men had had any news.  He just nodded in silence.

His mind was still on the retreating soldiers when, in the midst of pulling up another bushel of leeks, he spotted another handful of them, making their way on foot through the shade along the base of the ridge.  It was a common enough sight that he didn’t think much of it, but raised a hand in response to their far-away greeting and went back to his harvesting -- until he heard his name.

“Stiles!” 

His heart stopped, and the bushel of leeks spilled into the dirt.  He took two steps toward the soldiers, frantically shading his eyes to see more clearly.  “Who --?”

And then he saw him, leaning on a cane as he limped into view.  For a moment, Stiles wanted to throw his mattock at the ground and curse, because it was neither his father nor Derek, but that inclination passed quickly enough.  He waved once more, then ran for the house. 

“Mother,” he shouted, grabbing a jug to fill with water, “I have to get Heather.  It’s her father.  He’s returned from Gettysburg.”

It was quicker to climb the hill to get to Heather’s farm than it was to go around, but watching the struggle her father was going through just to walk along the bottom of the ridge, Stiles wasn’t certain her father would be able to make it over the hill.  By the time he returned, the three men had made minimal progress.  He waved again, leaving the water jug in the shade of the largest beech. 

It was a sweltering day, and Stiles wished he’d taken a swig of water himself by the time he finally reached Heather’s yard.  She was crouched amid rows of carrots, frowning at the rabbit-eaten portions of the greens, and looked up in surprise as he approached.

“Your father’s at the bottom of the hill,” he said, and she turned white, rising to her feet. 

“Is he --?” she asked immediately, because there were only three reasons for men to come home in the middle of the war: injury, desertion, or death.  He took Heather’s dirty gloved hand, tugging her along. 

“He’s walking,” Stiles said.  “Slowly, and with a cane, but he waved at me.”

He repeated the same words to Heather’s mother and two sisters, who were preparing dinner inside the house.  Her mother went immediately to the stable to saddle the mare; she was not going to attempt to climb over the hill, but the three girls followed Stiles back the way he’d come. 

Heather did not let go of his hand.  She glanced up at him as they approached the rock, looking apologetic. 

“He’ll come home, too,” she said.  “Your father’s a busy man.  The war’s not over; he still has work to do.”

“I know,” he replied stoically.  “I’m sure you’re right.” 

When they crested the top of the hill, however, they were surprised again by three smiling faces.  The girls descended upon their father, sobbing and kissing him, and even Heather, who seldom allowed herself displays of emotion, gave in to tears as she embraced him. 

“Can you climb the rest of the hill?” she asked, beaming at him.  “It’s a perfect place for a reunion.”

 

* * *

 

 ** _Three years later, May 1866_**  

In the retelling of the story of Heather’s father’s return, it became Reunion Hill, and Stiles never had the heart to correct the name after that.  Eventually it felt like that had been its name all along, long after all of the survivors and deserters had come home.  Stiles watched more than one reunion occur in the vicinity of the hill.  The fact that his own never did remained bitterly disappointing, although Stiles was usually willing to put up with that, over the course of the days and months and years that passed.  People came home; broken families were joined again.  And Stiles and his mother continued to wait. 

Periodically, when Stiles and Heather would walk across the field and discover the small things the soldiers had left behind on their way back to their own homes, they would tell stories about them. 

“He didn’t get fitted for spectacles until after he’d joined the Union Army,” Heather decided, holding up a broken pair of eyeglasses.  “At which point he made the mistake of telling an off-color joke, and a sensitive fellow in his regiment decked him.”

Stiles considered a fifty-cent piece.  “Hmmmm... his wife gave him this, telling him it was lucky, and when he came home from the war, he could use it to buy his first meal.”

“Bad luck for him,” Heather agreed, grinning.  They swept the ground with their eyes, walking slowly along the edge of the Stilinski south field.  At one point, she glanced up at Stiles.  “Can I ask you something?”

“You know you can.”

“Do you think he’s going to come back someday?”

Stiles didn’t have to ask who she was talking about.  He shrugged, his eyes on the brittle grass.  “I have no idea.”

“I just wasn’t sure what you _thought._   Do you suppose he remembers you, after all this time?”

The question made him feel anxious, more than the first question had.  Stiles had told Heather a lot about Derek, but he’d never talked about his curse, nor showed her the ring around his neck.  He crouched down on the ground, sifting through the tangle of roots with his fingers.  “I think so.  I hope so.”

She sighed.  “Isaac Lahey asked me to the church dance.”

“Yeah?”  Stiles couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be a girl, to have to depend on men to invite you to things like that -- but then, Stiles hadn’t bothered to invite anyone himself.  “You think you’re going to say yes?”

“I already did.”  She sounded more annoyed than happy.  “It’s not like anyone else is going to ask.”

“Probably not,” he agreed, and ducked away from her swat. 

It wasn’t until they were nearly at the base of the ridge that he added, “You know you’re my best friend, right?”

“I know.”

“And in my head, that’s way better than Isaac Lahey taking you to any old dance.”

She glared at him.  “I know,” she repeated, a little more impatiently.  “And I know that -- that you wouldn’t even want to do that with me.  So I’m doing it with somebody else.”

He nodded, feeling like he was missing something.  “Yeah, I know.”

“It’s fine,” she snapped, and turned to trudge up the hill.  But a few steps later, she turned and faced him again, hands clenched.  “Your major, I don’t think he’s coming back.  Even if he’s alive, Stiles, he’s just not going to show up and -- and _save_ you or something.”

Stiles stared after her in perplexity as she resumed her climb.  He wasn’t sure what he wanted to say to her.  _What in tarnation do you think I want him to save me from?  And what kind of blame-dang failure of a man would I be if I waited around for somebody else to figure out my life?  I know what I signed on for when I gave Derek what I did._

But walking back to the house was like descending into a trench of uncertainty, and by the time Stiles arrived in the kitchen, all he could do was stumble to the table and sit there, staring at his hands.

Eventually his mother, kneading the bread dough, said gently, “Some days are harder than others.”

Stiles nodded, trying not to flinch at her understanding, because she didn’t actually _understand_ , nor could she.  If he said _this isn’t about Father,_ he’d either have to explain it or lie to her.  He didn’t want to do either one.  And anyway, sometimes it really _was_ about his father, and that wasn’t a lie. 

But he was still heavy and conflicted from Heather’s comments, and his uncertainty came out in the form of echoed accusations.

“Mother... he’s not coming back.”

She folded the bread over and over into itself, working serenely.  “Do you think I’ve not told myself the same thing?”

“It’s been almost four years,” he said.  “How can you think anything else?”

She paused in kneading, breaking the dough into small loaves and shaping them on the breadboard.  “Stiles... all the wives of soldiers in the country, Union or Confederate, have little falsehoods they tell themselves in order to carry them through to the next day.  Most tell stories about God --”

“Mother!”  Stiles was genuinely shocked, not because he hadn’t wondered about God himself, but because he’d never once expected his mother to question Him. 

“Others live in a kind of dream world,” she went on, as though he had not spoken, “in which they talk to their husbands as though they are still there.  I have this irrational belief, and nothing more: your father is going to come home.”  She opened the door to the brick oven and neatly placed each loaf inside to bake, then closed the door firmly before looking up at him.  “Please allow me my falsehood, Stiles.  It’s not harming anyone.”

“It’s harming _you,”_ Stiles protested.  “Living like this? Tell me it doesn’t hurt, to wait and look and hope and still be alone at the end of every day?” 

“I didn’t say it didn’t hurt,” she said quietly.  “I said it’s not harming me.  There’s a difference.” 

He watched her weathered hands grasping one another, as though through time and pressure she could wring each lonely instant out of the day.  In that moment, he hated her patience and endurance, the way she bore his father’s absence with unquestioning stoicism.  _I can’t do it,_ he wanted to cry, and have her hold him.  But he could not.  His father was counting on the both of them to bear it, for each of them to be strong enough for the other. 

His mother sat at the table across from Stiles and reached for his hand.  He was always surprised how soft hers still were, after all these years of managing the farm. 

“It’s the easiest thing in the world to live with pain,” she said.  “But don’t ask me to live without hope.  I don’t know if I can be that strong.”

“No one is asking you to be, mother,” he replied, relenting, but she smiled, giving his hand a shake.

“We all have our own path to walk.  This is mine.  Yours... well.  Perhaps you can find your own story to tell yourself, just for today, to make the day bearable.”  She contemplated him.  “Tell me about him.”

He looked away.  She could not mean -- _no._   “About what?”

“Anything you want to tell me.”  She squeezed his hand.  “What do you remember?”

Stiles struggled to draw breath.  “I... well, I wish I’d had the chance to ask him about his commission, why he kept it from me, when I was -- ”

“Stiles,” she said.  He shut his mouth, feeling his cheeks heat.  “Do you think I know so little about my son that I would not be able to see the truth of the matter?”

He shook his head, trying to maintain his equilibrium, but even sitting down, he thought he might well faint dead away. 

“I’ve -- I’ve only told Heather,” he whispered.

“Mmmm.  That is probably for the best.”  She cocked her head.  “I admit curiosity as to his identity, myself, but I have not yet asked.  Nor will I, until you are ready to tell me.”

Stiles was startled again, but recovered quickly enough to clear his throat.  “It’s, um.  It’s Hale.”

Her eyes widened.  “Hale?  _Major_ Hale?”  For a moment, Stiles felt fear, that perhaps he should have kept his tarnal mouth shut.  “My goodness, you barely know him.” 

He shrugged.  “l... it turns out that doesn’t much matter to my heart.”

“Well.  That was unexpected.”  She shook her head in amazement, rising to her feet.  “I thought... well, it’s not important what I thought.  I believe this is a moment in which a mother must embrace her grown son, no matter how embarrassing it might feel.”

Stiles took advantage of the momentary sanctuary of his mother’s arms to squeeze his eyes tight and cry a little, and she did not make any mention of it.  She did kiss his cheek and murmur quiet sounds of comfort, and that was more calming than he would have expected.

“I knew you were suffering,” she said, holding his shoulders and looking up at him, “but now it is more clear to me how, and why.”

After that, on the hard days, Stiles appreciated knowing that his mother knew what was lacking, even if neither of them discussed it.  Heather was still a good friend and was more willing to inquire, but since her father had returned, it had been more challenging for Stiles to feel connected to her.  He still went to Reunion Hill with her and sat up on Indian Boulder, but sometimes he preferred to go and sit in the barn by himself, and close his eyes, and breathe in the memory of Derek’s skin mixed with the straw.  

* * *

 

**_September 1872 again_ **

Stiles figured there wasn’t anything more uncomfortable than waking up on a _cold_ boulder after the sun had dropped behind the trees, face smashed into the surface of the rock.  He groaned, immediately aware of all the ways in which his poor body had not appreciated that impromptu nap. 

Blinking at the sky, he groaned again, this time because he knew without a shadow of a doubt that he was late, late, late for afternoon milking.  His mother would fill in, or Jess or Annie if they hadn’t gone home already.  Stiles was usually more responsible than that, and he knew it wouldn’t be the end of the world for him to make one mistake, but he didn’t like what it implied about himself. 

It was only because he crested the ridge at a jog and was moving so quickly toward home that he saw the two figures before they vanished into the stand of beeches.  Men, though not soldiers by the look of them, at least the glimpse he’d caught of them from the back.  Stiles followed them through the grove to where he knew it would emerge near his farm. 

He could hear snatches of their quiet conversation.  He was too far away to discern what they were saying, but it was close enough to tell that they were not in pain or distress.  Stiles picked up his pace as he jogged along the familiar trail.  

And then he could hear faint words, and he stopped where he was, almost stumbling as he jerked to a halt: “You still haven’t seen all of it.  I’m not making any assumptions.”  The words didn’t make a lot of sense, but the voice was heart-stoppingly familiar.

But that was nothing compared to the weary, exasperated voice that spoke next.  “Derek, it’s pointless, understand?  Whatever this place was to me once, it’s not home anymore.”

_Derek.  And --_

“Father?” he whispered.

Stiles watched as the distant figures halted, the bigger one’s hand on the smaller one’s arm.  He gripped the nearest beech limb, willing his knees not to buckle. 

Stiles supposed it would have been easy enough to mistake another’s voice for Derek’s, after one day of memories in ten years.  Except that the other voice -- _his father’s voice --_ had _called_ him Derek. 

 _Derek._ The word was barely loud enough to carry past his lips, but he saw the figure turn, his eyes widening as he caught sight of Stiles behind the beech.  Stiles felt the tension in his gut explode like a Ketchum grenade. 

When he saw Derek’s lips make the shape of _Stiles,_ it was like no one had really said his name since the war began.  He couldn’t quite believe he’d lasted this long without hearing Derek say it to him again.

Then the other man turned, following the direction of Derek’s gaze, and Stiles’ jaw went slack.  It was his father -- and yet it _wasn’t._ His body looked the same, if somewhat older, his hair more liberally shot with gray, and he’d lost a staggering amount of weight.  But his face was somehow vague, anxious and grasping, like it was trying and failing to hang on to what was going on around him.  When he looked at Stiles, the expression didn’t change. 

“No,” Stiles muttered, starting across the stand of trees toward them, “no, no, you can’t... you _can’t._ ”

He had no idea what he was going to do once he reached them, but each step in the dry leaves made the tension worse.  It sped him up rather than slowing him down, until he was less than a dozen steps away.  That was where he stopped, fairly shaking with confusion. 

“Derek,” he panted, clenching and unclenching his fists.  It was too much, of course, because he wasn’t even supposed to know Major Hale’s given name, but it was all he could do not to rush over and try to kiss him.  No matter what horrors had befallen his father, Stiles was not about to do that in front of him.  But Derek just looked pained, and his father continued exhibiting nothing but desperate confusion.  Stiles looked back and forth between the two of them, and asked the only question he could.  “What’s going _on_ here?”

“Stiles.”  Derek’s face hadn’t aged a day, but it was shadowed.  Whatever emotions he might be experiencing were under tight reign.  He looked at Stiles impassively.  “Your father is still not well and needs food and rest.  I suggest we take him to your house immediately.”

Stiles nodded, speechless. He approached his father slowly, looking for some sign of recognition on his face.

His father furrowed his brow, concentrating.  “Stiles,” he said.  “You’re Stiles.”

“Yes,” said Stiles with a relieved sigh.  But his relief was short-lived as he watched his father shake his head with regret.

“Major Hale told me we’d be looking for you, and... that I might remember you.”

“Yeah.  I’m your son.” Stiles heard his voice crack, and he clamped down on it, even as he saw the flash in Derek’s eye.  His father turned toward Derek for support. 

“The two of you, you know each other?”

Stiles had no idea what to say to that.  But Derek came around until he was standing beside Stiles, facing Stiles’ father, and put a hand on Stiles’ shoulder.  It could have been casual, brotherly, but Stiles felt himself react to the contact anyway.  He hoped, considering the state his father was in, he might not even notice.  But his father looked at the hand, at Stiles, and chewed on his lip, nodding slowly.

“Yes,” he said, “I... see you do.”

“We met long ago,” Derek said quietly.  His hand tightened on Stiles’ shoulder.  “When I came to this farm to find you, before Antietam.”

His father nodded again, somewhat impatiently.  “You told me, yes.” 

Stiles watched his father watching them.  Part of him was struggling to cope with the sensations wrought by Derek’s hand on him.  Another part was assimilating the reality that _this was his father,_ and he didn’t even _recognize_ Stiles -- although both the impatience and the savvy way he was looking at them made him think that inside, his father had all his wits just the same.  Still another part was wondering what exactly his father thought was going on between him and Derek (and that part was kind of staring at his father stupidly, because his father seemed to have brushed aside the evidence of their connection with nary a grimace, and there was no way it could be that easy?).

“I... think I might need a moment, myself,” Stiles said.  He dared not look at Derek, but neither did he think he could pull away from his hand. 

“Your mother,” said Derek.  Stiles nodded unhappily.  “She’ll want to see him?”

“By Jove, would you expect anything else?” he snapped. Derek dropped his grip on Stiles’ arm, taking a slow breath. 

“You would be surprised how many families who’d given up on finding their loved ones preferred not to... to be expected to suffer through the trauma of reunion.”

 _Now_ Stiles stared at him.  _Still pretty,_ he thought.  _More than I remembered._   _Almost too pretty to be real._

“That’s horrible,” he said.  “And we _never_ gave up.”

Derek’s lips parted, and his eyes flickered away across the ground, but not before Stiles caught a glimpse of what lurked behind his mask.  It made it almost impossible to breathe, to move, to do anything at all. 

His father came forward, looking grim and resolute.  “Stiles, I imagine this is a terrible disappointment to you, but... I haven’t given up, either.  I need to meet -- to see your mother. Will you take me to her?  I hope at the very least it will bring her peace to know I did not die in the war.”

 _But you did,_ he wanted to say.  _You did die, if not in battle._   But he nodded, gesturing awkwardly.  “It’s -- this way.”

As they walked, Derek and his father together told the story of Lieutenant Colonel Stilinski’s near-fatal head injury at Antietam.  He had been left for dead by the Union army, along with thousands of other soldiers on both sides. 

“Major Hale -- Derek, I suppose I can call him that, if you know him -- Derek came back to look for me, but I’d been captured by Confederate soldiers.  I’d been stripped of my uniform by then, and I had no memory of myself, nor of my life before the war.”

Stiles tried not to think about what that must have been like, but his imagination was too vivid. He grimaced.  “Where were you?”

“Once my visible wounds healed, they took me to Elmira, in New York.  It was a prison for soldiers of war.  No one recognized me -- and no wonder, as I’d only just returned to duty.”

“The conditions were horrible,” Derek said, his eyes dark.  “I did not arrive at Elmira until after the Colonel had been moved, but many prisoners died from malnutrition and sickness.”

Stiles’ father trudged through the brush, pushing aside the scrub and small trees.  “I am still stunned you found me at all, Derek, especially after such a long time.”

Derek did not respond, but glanced at Stiles for just a moment.  Stiles wished with every piece of himself that he could reach for Derek’s hand.  But he had waited this long.  It was no real hardship to wait a little longer. 

 _Assuming he still wants that,_ the voice in his mind taunted.  _Ten years is an impossibly long time to be apart from anyone.  And what kind of a promise can one realistically make after one night together?_

But Stiles knew exactly what kind of a promise one could make.  Although he had no evidence it was still being watched over by Derek, in all this time, he hadn’t yet recovered his heart.  His heart hadn’t felt like an essential thing, and for most of the last ten years, he’d had no reason to miss it. 

His father was going on.  “It was five years ago when he caught up with me in Scranton.  I’d recovered very little of my memory and was doing odd jobs, getting by.  No one had made any effort to locate me, thinking me dead.”

“We did not receive word of your death,” Stiles said.  They were nearly at the perimeter fence.  “I think they did not know, themselves.  Perhaps they did look for you.”

He shrugged. “I think, if they had, things would have turned out very differently.”

“Look...!”  Stiles saw the other two men startle at his outburst, and he tried to temper his voice, beginning again.  “Look.  This... you returning, this is going to be a big deal for my mother.  She’s going to have lots of questions.  I really don’t think she’s going to give you a chance to do much for yourself once she sees you.  Can we just... go to the stable and take a moment to wash up, and rest for a bit?  And then we can go into the house, I promise, it’ll be okay.”  After what Derek had said, he wasn’t at all sure anymore, but he said it again, just to have said it.  “It’ll be okay.”

Derek nodded, watching Stiles’ father.  At his answering nod, Derek went ahead of them, straight for the location of the barn, even though it was not yet in sight.  Whether he was guided by memory or scent or something beyond Stiles’ ken, he did not know. 

Stiles followed, scanning for his mother, but caught no glimpse of her in the yard before they reached the door to the stable.  He went to the pump by the horse trough, pouring a bucket of clean water and bringing the dipper cup for them all to drink in the cool shade. The men took off their coats and unbuttoned their collars, wetting their faces and necks. 

Seeing his father there, crouching in the straw of his own barn, was the strangest feeling.  Stiles knelt before him, staring up into his face.  “You don’t recognize this place?  None of it?”

He saw that same intense look of concentration come over his father’s face.  “I -- I don’t know.  Not exactly, but... there’s something... like a dream, where things look familiar, but you’re not sure what you’ve imagined and what’s real?”  He gave a sharp sigh, shaking his head.  “I don’t know.  I’m too tired to do this right now.”

“There’s a cot in the back of the barn,” Stiles told him, beckoning.  “I set one up after Harriet had a difficult time with her last foal.”  He didn’t say anything about how the stable was sometimes the only place he _could_ sleep, anymore. 

He watched his father sink down onto the rough cot with a grateful exhalation, as though it were a feather bed.  He was asleep in less than two minutes.  Stiles stayed, standing there, watching him, and he thought, _my father’s here in my barn and mother doesn’t know he’s here, and I should go tell her, but all I can think about is --_

“Stiles,” Derek said behind him, his voice soft. 

The tone made him lose his balance, stepping backwards -- and stumbled right into Derek’s immovable chest.  He almost cried out.

Derek caught him, whispering urgently, “Tell me this is all right, please, yes or no, just tell me...”

“Yes,” Stiles whispered back, turning around to face Derek, his arms fumbling to wrap around him, “yes, by God, yes.”

Derek didn’t do anything more than hold him right where he was for several minutes.  When he did move, it was just one hand, shifting to stroke Stiles’ hair, to touch his cheek, and then returning to hold him steady. 

“He’s okay.”  Stiles could feel the sound of the words through Derek’s throat, vibrating against his cheek.  “He’ll sleep for a spell, and you’ll bring your mother in here soon enough.  You’re fine.”

Stiles had no idea what Derek meant by _fine_ , but he nodded anyway, squeezing Derek tighter, tighter.  Letting go was an impossibility.  He smiled, trying out the expression in the context of the situation.  _My father’s here, sleeping less than three feet from where I’m holding my -- my --_

“I still have your ring around my neck,” he murmured. 

Derek went very still.  “Oh... Stiles.”

“I don’t want you to make that mean anything.  I said I would keep it, and I did.  That was a long time ago.  You’re not obligated to do, or be, anything for me.”

Derek adjusted his hold around Stiles’ waist.  Now he was looking him in the face.  His expression was penitent. 

“I would beg your forgiveness.”

Stiles stared at him.  “For what?”  He shook his head.  “Derek, you brought my father home to me.  You spent years looking for him.  What kind of apology could you possibly think you owe me?”

“I lost track of him,” Derek said, gritting his teeth.  “I took your father _away_ from you, and then I lost him on the battlefield at Antietam.  And then when I found him again, and it became clear he might not ever recover....  I couldn’t explain the kind of debt I had to him, but I could no sooner have left him than cut off my own arm.  It was what I could do.  For you.”

“For me?” Stiles echoed.

“You gave me your heart.”  Derek touched his face with one rough and weathered hand.  “I do not treat that offer lightly.”

An incredulous laugh escaped his lips.  “Uh... no.  It seems you don’t.”

“I cannot presume the situation between us will be the same as it was ten years ago.  Ten years can change a lot.”  He dropped his hand to Stiles’ neck, finding the ring with his fingers.  “But I would ask you... I beg you.  Once your father has had a chance to resume his own life, give _me_ the chance to make of this what we will.”  He paused.  “I do not know precisely how that might be done.  I can predict it will be... hard.”

Stiles’ mind was reeling.  The possibilities in his mind were bright and detailed and compelling.  Mostly they involved doing ordinary things together: working the farm, eating at the same table, sleeping beside one another.  Each one made his heart ache with longing. 

“I don’t think I can have the things I want,” he said.  “I mean... what if anyone were to find out?”

“The risk is not insignificant.  It hurts me to think about putting you at risk in any way.  But...”  Derek straightened up, raising his chin.  “Hundreds of thousands of men stood up against hundreds of thousands more to fight for what they believed in.  This is something I believe in just as strongly: our right to live our lives the way we choose, free from persecution.  I would fight and die for that, if need be.”  He smiled, but the way it looked on his face, it wasn’t a friendly smile.  “But I think anyone who tries will find me hard to kill.”

Stiles was absorbed in studying his face.  Being this close to it, it was hard to think about anything else, but he managed to tell Derek the next thing.  “My mother... she knows about you.  About us.”

Derek’s smile froze and his face went white.  “You told her?”

“She guessed there was somebody.  I told her it was you.  She only replied, _you hardly know him.”_   Stiles grinned weakly at Derek’s surprise.  “Which is true.  I still hardly know you.  And I told her... it didn’t much matter to my heart.”

The white turned to red as Derek flushed, but now he was smiling.  “I think I may never stop being surprised by things that come out of your mouth, Stiles.”

 _That_ comment was a dangerous one to make, with his father right there in the room.  But he wasn’t going to walk away with nothing.  Stiles leaned over -- they were just about the same height, now -- and kissed him soundly on his lips.

Derek made a surprised gasp.  It was muffled by Stiles’ mouth, but still might have been construed as too loud -- if Stiles had given a fart in a whirlwind about that, or about anything at that moment.  His father didn’t move a muscle, but even if he had, that might not have stopped Stiles, either.  His attention was all on Derek, Derek’s hands in his hair, Derek’s breath rasping in his chest.

“One hour was too long,” he muttered into Derek’s neck, “one day was awful, one month was torture -- one year was unbearable -- and ten years… I don’t ever want to do anything like that again.”

“No,” Derek agreed in a whisper, “no, we won’t do that.”

Stiles felt the unreality of the situation coursing over him like the Potomac.  He was shaking with it, wrapping his arms around Derek’s neck.

“You’re really here?” he demanded, grasping Derek’s face.  “This -- it’s really happening?”

“I promise you that,” Derek said, between frantic kisses.  “I don’t think I know anything else, but that, I know.  I’m really here, and this is really happening.”  Stiles could see the tears glistening in his eyes.  “At last.”

“I want to thank you,” Stiles said, “for everything, and properly.  But I would rather we had more time, and, uh... privacy.”

“I think that might be able to be arranged, later.”  Derek let him slide down his body to the floor, coaxing mutual desperate noises out of both of them.  He inhaled slowly, then let it out, shifting until only their joined hands were in contact.  “I did not want to presume you still wanted that from me.”

Stiles chuckled to himself, shaking his head.  “Whatever might have changed in ten years, I think you can rest easy knowing I _still want that from you.”_  

Derek’s eyes flickered down his body, and Stiles felt it like the touch of Derek’s hand.  He flinched, listening to Derek’s breath rasp in his throat.  “As I have wanted it from you.  But now, I think it is time for me to employ some self-control, and for you to bring your mother here, so I might explain the situation to her before your father wakes.”

The walk from the barn to the other side of the house felt unfathomably long, but it gave Stiles a few minutes to collect himself.  He could feel the new pieces of his life trying to settle into place.  No matter how welcome they were, it was clear it would take some time before they fit comfortably.  He touched the ring under his shirt, and focused his thoughts on how he would explain this to his mother.

But the moment he saw her shelling peas in the kitchen garden, all the careful words flew out of his head, and Stiles could only stammer out, “Mother --”

She looked up reproachfully.  “Stiles, where have you been all afternoon?  Jess finished the weeding without you, I had to gather in the dry laundry myself, and the cows are full to bursting.  And now supper will be late.”  Then she saw his face, and she dropped the peas into the bowl, rising to her feet.  “What is it?  What happened?”

“You have to come to the barn,” he said.  “Just -- you have to see.  I don’t know what else to say.”

She did not question him again, but untied her apron and hurried after him.  Her face was set, bracing herself for whatever she might find.  But when Derek appeared in the doorway of the barn, she stopped where she was, staring at him. 

“Mrs. Stilinski,” he said, putting out both hands to forestall her, and she began to cry.

“Just -- give me the letter, Major.  I thought, if they hadn’t bothered to deliver it, that there was still a chance he was still alive, but... it’s better to know. Give it to me.”

“Mother, no,” Stiles protested, but Derek came to her, standing as close as decorum allowed. 

“The colonel may not ever be the same again,” he said, “but he’s not dead, not by a long shot.”

She sagged at the words, leaning on Stiles for support.  For a moment he thought she might faint.  “Oh...” she breathed.  “Praise God.”

“He was injured, long ago, and I’ve been watching over him for the past several years as he’s recovered.”  He looked so earnest, Stiles felt like he might cry himself.  “Ma’am, he’s forgotten a lot.  He didn’t know Stiles, and he doesn’t remember you or this farm, or anything about his life here.”

“It doesn’t matter.  Where is he?  Major, I insist you take me to him immediately.”  She went for the barn again, presumably to saddle Harriet.  Derek didn’t stand in her way this time, but followed her inside.  When her eyes had adjusted to the light inside and she saw him on the cot, she let out a soft _oh,_ rushing forward to crouch by his side. 

“I’ll be outside,” Derek said under his breath, but Stiles grabbed his arm. 

“No.  Stay.”  He didn’t know how to explain how it felt, to consider being away from him, but the way Derek’s shoulders settled as he nodded, Stiles thought he might understand.   Derek fell into a kind of parade rest beside him, and they watched Stiles’ mother lay her hands carefully on his father’s shoulder, his chest, his face.  His father gradually stirred, opening his eyes, and sat back quickly when he saw her kneeling so close.

“Don’t be afraid,” she said calmly.  “I’m Claudia... your wife.”

“Yes.”  His father rose up on one arm. “Yes, Major Hale told me all about you.”  He winced as he sat forward.  “Forgive me; my body’s forgotten what it’s like to sleep on a bed.”

“You’ll have plenty of things to relearn.”  She smiled at him, the kind of smile Stiles hadn’t seen on her face in years.  “There’s food in the house, for both of you.  You too, Stiles, once you’ve seen to those poor cows.”

His father looked startled at every small kindness, but he did not shy away from his mother, and he listened attentively to her words as they rose.  She had never been a woman given to small talk, nor did she resort to it now, providing instead brief descriptions of each area of the farm, efficiently filling in the empty spaces in his father’s mind.  He could see how hungry his father was to drink it all in.

Derek and Stiles walked several steps behind, Derek’s face amazed as he watched them.

“Not much throws her, hmm?”

Stiles had to grin.  “Not much,” he agreed. 

Derek looked at him now.  “What about... this?”

Stiles didn’t ask what _this_ was.  “I don’t know.  We don’t talk about it.  I don’t even know what this really is, myself, so... I think we wait and see?”

Derek didn’t appear offended by his implication.  It made Stiles breathe easier as they followed them toward the house.  They could take this one step at a time. 

“Watching him,” Stiles said, gesturing toward his father, “it’s odd.  When I realized what had happened to him, I think I expected that talking to him would be like talking to a stranger.  But he’s not.  He’s still himself, even if _he_ doesn’t remember.  Right there -- the way he holds his arms when he walks, and leans in toward my mother as he’s talking to her.  It’s all familiar to me.”

Derek nodded. “I am relieved.  I kept him away from you for longer than I’d originally planned, simply because I wanted him to be well before I brought him home, but... eventually, I had to give up on him getting entirely well without help from his family.  The doctors we spoke with in our travels suggested that being here, around you and your mother, would be the best thing for him.  In time, simply being here might help bring back his memory.”

Stiles dropped his voice further.  “Am I to understand it is your curse that helped you find him in the first place?”

Derek’s lip twitched.  “Perhaps.”

“Did you... scent him?  Track him?”

“It’s not as simple as that.”  But Derek was regarding him curiously.  “You truly have no fear about my condition?”

Stiles coughed.  “On the contrary, I truly _do._   But you have proved yourself to be more honorable and trustworthy than most men, many times over.  I don’t think I should judge you on any other merits than those.”

That seemed to please Derek, and he was almost smiling when they entered the house with his parents.  His mother presented Derek and his father with bread and brandy and slices of cheese while she finished supper preparations and Stiles took care of the cows.  They did not even make an attempt at formality, but just sat in the kitchen with her while she worked, tossing questions back and forth about Derek and his father’s travails and the farm.  It felt remarkably comfortable, and even Derek’s contributions did not seem out of place.  At one point, when his mother actually laughed, Stiles thought his heart might burst with happiness. 

But by the time they’d cleaned up from the meal, Stiles still hadn’t figured out how to approach the question of where everyone would stay.  It wasn’t until his mother came to Stiles, her hands folded tightly over a pillow and an old quilt, that he realized how much he’d been worried that she might expect Derek to leave that night.

“Your father will sleep in your bed,” she said.  “Will you ensure the Major is comfortable on the cot in the stable before retiring?”

She wasn’t suggesting Stiles return to the house.  Stiles nodded, then hesitated, not wanting to press her, not when it was clear she was already feeling the strain of the afternoon, but it had been just the two of them for too many years for him not to ask.  “Are you going to be all right here tonight?”

“Your father is much closer to being home than he was yesterday, Stiles,” she said.  “I will spend my evening giving solemn thanks for that.”

It was as close to an answer as he was going to get.  Stiles kissed her cheek, then went to find his father.

He was sorting through the belongings he’d brought with him, lining everything up as though each small thing were a relic of immeasurable value.  _Perhaps when your memory is gone,_ Stiles thought, _that’s not far from the truth_. 

Stiles paused at the top of the ladder, but his father beckoned him into the loft.

“Thank you for suggesting the rest earlier,” he said.  “This day has turned out far better than I could have hoped, and I owe a great deal of that to you.”  He regarded Stiles.  “I suspect I was never a demonstrative man.”

“No, sir,” Stiles agreed.  His father nodded thoughtfully.

“Losing my memory was difficult.  It took me many years to see my situation as anything but a burden.  But eventually, I decided I must view it as a chance to do things better the second time.  This... this is something I can improve.”

Stiles could count on one hand the number of times he recalled his father hugging him.  It caught him off-guard, and he found himself clinging a little longer, his cheek pressed to his father’s shoulder.

“I’m so grateful to be here,” his father murmured.  “Your mother is miraculous.  I can already see why I married her.  And you...”

Stiles held his breath a moment, reluctant to meet his father’s eyes as he pulled away from the embrace.  But his father’s expression was complacent.

“You’ve done a fine job managing the farm, Stiles.  I want you to know I’m not here to take it away from you.”

“It’s been my home for most of my life,” Stiles said.  “I don’t want to leave, sir.  But... I think it would be worthwhile to discover what exists outside Maryland.  I just can’t be certain what might -- might call me away.  Or where.” 

“Or whom?”

Stiles tried not to squirm.  “I don’t know.”

His father pressed his lips together.  “I won’t presume to speak for your mother, nor to think my opinion carries the weight it once did.  But I have spent the past six years with Derek Hale.  I know exactly what kind of a man he is.  I’ve trusted him with my life more than once.  You’re not going to get one word of argument from me if your path follows his.”

Stiles stammered whatever thanks were on his lips, picked up the blanket and pillow, and shimmied down the ladder before he could make a fool of himself.  It was almost too much for him to hold in his mind: his father, home; his mother, resolutely nursing his father back to health... and Derek, standing in his parlor, hands behind his back, examining the portraits of Stiles’ family that hung on the wall. 

He indicated the one of Stiles’ great-grandfather.  “He looks like you.”

“My father always said that, too.”  Stiles stared at the picture for a moment before holding out the quilt.  “My mother wants me to -- to help you get comfortable.  In the stable.”

Derek’s mouth opened, his eyes lit with startled amusement.  “Really.”

“My father’s sleeping in my bed.  Which leaves the stable, unless I want to brave the biting flies outside.  You...”  He bit his lip.  “You can have the cot.  If you want it.”

“Straw in a dry barn suits me fine.”  The way Derek was looking at him was making it hard to remain standing.  “ _You_ can have the cot.”

“I don’t _want_ the cot,” Stiles hissed.  “ _Nobody_ should have the cot.  Unless -- do you want me to have it?”

Derek looked like he might burst out laughing any moment.  “Just come with me to the stable, Stiles.”

He hung the lantern safely overhead, then spread the quilt on the straw in the empty stall while Derek took off his shirt, but after a few moments of that, he had to stop what he was doing and watch.  Derek unbuttoned the cuffs of his sleeves, looking down on Stiles with tense anticipation.

“I imagine you do not stare at other men like that, when they take off their clothing.”

“Not all of them,” Stiles admitted.  “And none when I know they are watching.  Though I do suspect Danny Māhealani of looking back, sometimes.”

“You could have taken other men to your bed, but you did not.”  He eased his shirt off his shoulders, draping it over the stall door. 

Stiles shook his head.  “It wasn’t because I didn’t want --”  He paused, embarrassed. “I thought about it.  A lot.  When I remembered you, remembered what we’d done.”

Derek knelt before beginning to unbutton Stiles’ own shirt.  “You have good memories of that.”

“Yes,” he exhaled, closing his eyes.  “You showed me so many things.  I never expected to want it so much, but after that, it was... well, obvious that I did.”

“And yet you did not seek it out.”  He shivered as Derek’s hands moved over his bare ribs, his chest, and landed on the ring suspended around his neck.  “Can you tell me why?”

Stiles moistened dry lips.  “I -- lots of reasons, I suppose, beginning with --”

“Stiles,” Derek said, his voice soft.  He gave the string a little tug.  “Tell me why.”

“Because I’m yours,” Stiles whispered.  He opened his eyes to see Derek crouching back on his heels, flushed and staring, gripping the ring in his fist.  He also looked a little apologetic.

“Selfish of me to ask,” he said.  “You don’t really have to... to believe that.”

But Stiles quickly shook his head.  “I was not sure I did, until I saw you again.  But now, I’m sure.  As sure as I can be about anything. Whatever was there between us ten years ago, it’s still there.”

“I still need you to tell me.”  Derek gazed at him meaningfully.  “Every day you want that, I need to hear it.  And if there’s ever a day when you decide you don’t want it anymore, I need to tell me that, too.”

“If there ever comes a day when I don’t want to be yours, Derek Hale, I’ll be sure to let you know.  But I do not believe there has been one day like that in the past ten years.”  He smiled so broadly that Derek paused, touching Stiles’ face with one sweaty hand. 

“You mustn’t let fear, or any other thing, stop you smiling like that,” said Derek.  “There is nothing I would not do to bring about that smile.”

Overwhelmed by the events of the day, Stiles could do little else but laugh.  “I think I believe you.”

* * *

**_October 1872, one month later_ **

 “Stiles?” 

 Stiles had almost grown accustomed to hearing his father’s voice calling to him across the barnyard.  He heard it less and less these days as his father grew more confident about the workings of the farm.  Stiles had no compunction against calling back, “I’ve got my hands full -- ask Derek.” 

By the time he’d finally finished with the repairs to the pigs’ trough and made it across to where his father was, he and Derek were loading the last of the corn into the wagon for transport to the mill.  He grinned at his father.  “Looks like we beat the rain, after all.”

His father gave him a withering look.  “Who’s _we?_ ”

“Less than a week behind this year,” Stiles went on, ignoring the jibe.  “That, plus the good harvest, should net us a good trade for Lahey’s alfalfa.”

Derek lifted the hitch on the wagon and latched it firmly in place, then pulled the cover down over the bushels.  “It’ll be ready to go in the morning.  I’ll go tell Mrs. Stilinski we’re finished.”

Stiles’ father didn’t watch him go, but as soon as Derek was out of earshot (at least by human standards; Stiles was privately certain Derek could hear every word they were saying), he nodded after him.  “He doesn’t have to keep calling her that.”

“I’m not sure what else he’d call her,” Stiles said carefully.  His father shrugged.

“Seems a dang sight formal for what we’ve got going here.  Even Jess and Annie call her _Claudia._ ”

There was no question in any of their minds that Derek was more than a hired hand, no matter what he might be portraying to the rest of Montgomery County, but what he _actually_ was continued to go unspoken.  Stiles’ father had done the most hinting and poking at the truth, but he’d mostly let Derek remain silent.  Stiles wasn’t sure what he should say in response, so he didn’t say anything. 

Stiles already felt lucky enough to have managed to keep Derek this long into the fall, past the time when Annie and Jess had bid them farewell until the spring.  Without Derek, they still had enough hands to get in the rest of the squash and sweet potatoes and other crops before winter set in, so there was no real reason to keep him on.  Stiles also knew the amount Derek was willing to accept in payment was far below what a man of his breeding and education should earn. 

 _You give me room and board,_ Derek always pointed out when Stiles tried to offer more, and wouldn’t hear another word on the subject. 

His mother seemed particularly on edge that evening, however, and Derek even more quiet than usual while they ate.  Stiles had to wonder what had transpired between the two of them.  Derek bid good night to the family as he always did after supper, and Stiles let him head out to the barn on his own.  He usually waited for everyone else to fall asleep before following Derek to the empty stall, and they both woke early enough to begin their morning chores.  Whatever anyone might suspect the two of them were doing together, on the surface it continued to look respectable enough.  

But later, long after he should have been abed, Stiles made a quick trip to the kitchen for more kerosine for his lamp -- and happened upon his mother, crying into her apron.  It was enough to horrify him, seeing his mother do that, but he went to her immediately, hovering close and asking anxiously, “What is it? Are you in pain?”

She shook her head, wiping her eyes.  “Not in the way you mean.”

“Then what?  Did -- did something happen?  Did Derek say something to you?”

“No, Stiles, he said nothing.  It is my own heart that is sore, all on its own.”  She raised red, determined eyes to his.  “I do not think it can go on this way.”

“What?”  He felt himself tense, glancing in the direction of the barn.  “Tell me.”

“It is not _fair_ for the world to be the way it is,” she said, her voice rapid and tight, and low enough to keep it from carrying.  “I am grateful every day for the return of your father, even if his memory has not returned.  And I have not lost hope.”

“I know that has been hard for you,” he began, but she shook her head. 

“To be his wife in name, I can accept.  To feel this abiding love, and to remain constant, even if he -- “  She swallowed the rest of the sentence.  “It is a reasonable cross to bear.  But to know that love exists in this house, and goes unacknowledged... I do not think I can bear that cross.  Not for my son.”

“For -- for me?”  Stiles took a step back, feeling his face heat.

She looked at him reproachfully.  “You _may_ not look at me and deny it, Stiles, not when I know how it feels to stand in the presence of my own husband and for there to be distance between us.  Watching the two of you... _tolerating_ the way it is... I cannot in good conscience allow that to go on.”  She reached for his hands and held them tight.  “Love is the surest of all of God’s blessings.  No, the world is not fair.  But of all the things in the world I can change, my own household is one of them.  And even if you cannot hold your love’s hand before the rest of Montgomery Village, I say in _this_ house, you must be allowed to do so.”

“Mother.”  Stiles stared at her hand, not trusting his own voice.  She took pity on him and hugged him. 

“For Derek to sleep in the barn like the hired help, and for my own son to do the same every night, is an inequity for which I cannot stand.”  She put a hand over his heart, covering the ring that still hung on its string.  “And now that I know what this means to you, Stiles, I think you must wear it properly.”

He gaped at her.  “People will talk,” he stammered.

“People always do.  My conscience dictates my life, not the gossip of the members of the church rotary.  Let me handle that.”  She nodded toward the barn.  “You bring him inside now, and tell him what I have said.”

He had to hug her again before dashing toward the door, but he paused once more.  “Father does love you, you know.  All over again.” 

She smiled.  “I know.  I waited long enough for him to court me the first time; I won’t give up on him the second time.  He’ll come to me when he’s ready.”

“I’m just saying, maybe he does not have the courage, without his memory.”  He shook his head.  “And I can’t believe I’m talking to my own mother about her relationship with my _father_.”

“Stiles,” she chided.  “Don’t tell me, after all this time, you’re standing on propriety.  _Go._ ”

Stiles was still wearing the same enormous smile when he leaned over Derek on the cot, scarcely waiting for him to emerge from sleep before covering him with kisses.  Derek woke laughing, fending him off with a drowsy hand. 

“Am I to be denied my rest?”

“Tonight, you are,” Stiles said. He helped Derek sit up, rubbing his eyes and yawning.  “I don’t quite know what to make of it, but... my mother has instructed me to bring you to the house tonight.”

“To the house?” Derek repeated blankly. 

“To my bed,” Stiles clarified.  He watched Derek’s eyes fly open with amusement.  “It is no joke.  Derek, she said we deserve to be able to show our love -- that, in her household, it would be a sin _not_ to acknowledge it.”

Derek looked as though Ebenezer had kicked him in the head. 

“I’m at a loss,” he said at last, somewhat faintly.

“Just come with me,” Stiles said, tugging him to his feet.  “We can talk it to death in the morning.  Tonight, let’s just not question it.”

He let Stiles lead him to the front door, hesitating only a moment on the porch before entering the dark house.  Stiles did not expect his mother to be waiting for them, but she was, her hair already loose and brushed, wearing her nightclothes and wrap.  Derek looked embarrassed to see her thus, but she simply smiled at him, reaching for his hand.

“You have been welcome in our home from the beginning, Derek,” she said.  “You have earned your place in this family many times over.  But this is about no more or less than what exists between you and Stiles.  I know I am not the only one who thinks so.”

“Ma’am,” he said, and had to pause to clear his throat.  Stiles was fairly dancing with nerves beside him, but when she took his hand and brought Derek’s together with it, he felt everything inside him go quiet.  Derek watched her with wide, amazed eyes.

“Claudia,” she said.  “If I am to be the mother of your household, you should at least accord me that courtesy.”

Stiles could scarcely breathe to watch the smile that spread across Derek’s face. 

“Claudia,” he echoed.  “It would be my most sincere pleasure.”

She stepped forward, as composed as any lady, as though she were not in her nightclothes, and kissed Derek’s cheek.  When she stepped back, Stiles was still holding Derek’s hand, and Derek did not let it go. 

“I regret you will have to manage with the small bed, until Stiles can go into town to buy enough cut boards to build a bigger one.  Tomorrow, when you bring the corn to the miller’s.  Good night.” 

“Good night,” they said in chorus, and Stiles had to bite his lip to keep from laughing aloud. 

Stiles preceded Derek up the ladder to the loft, ducking with long practice to avoid the low beams above their head.  As Stiles hung the lantern, Derek sank down on the edge of Stiles’ bed, his eyes fixed on the arrangement of items under the eaves.  

“What are they?” he asked softly. 

Stiles reached down and picked up the sixpence, handing it to Derek.  “I collected them from the fields around Reunion Hill.  Heather -- Mrs. Lahey -- and I, we would find the things the soldiers left and tell stories about them.  Her collection is even more impressive than mine.”

He nodded, holding the sixpence in his palm.  “So many things lost.  So many people.”

“I can’t imagine the magnitude.”  Stiles brushed Derek’s knuckles with the tips of his fingers.  “But we can be grateful for what we have.”

Derek looked into his eyes.  “Unquestionably,” he said, his voice hoarse.

Stiles slipped his hand under his collar and pulled the old, yellowed circle of string over his head, biting it in half to release the circlet of gold into his hand. He handed it back to Derek, who looked startled to be suddenly holding it along with the sixpence.  Then he reached down again to the row of trinkets, picking up the ring Heather had found years before. 

“My mother suggested I should wear that properly,” he said.  “If... that suits you.”

Derek paused only to set the sixpence down before reaching for Stiles’ hand.  He shifted off the bed to kneel beside him, and although his voice shook, his fingers were steady as they slipped the ring onto Stiles’ smallest finger.  It fit better than it had when he was sixteen.  Stiles traced the smooth metal with his thumb.

“I have waited too many years to do that,” Derek said. 

Stiles fumbled a little, trying to find a finger on Derek’s hand that would fit the wide band, but eventually settled on the fourth.  It was only a little loose.  When he interlaced their fingers, both rings shone in the lamplight.  He smiled, feeling his pulse in his throat, and lost himself for a few moments in Derek’s arms.  _We will sleep in my bed together tonight,_ he thought, heady with possibilities.  _And tomorrow, we will build our marriage bed._

Derek’s kiss was more insistent than chaste, but Stiles thought it was a suitable kiss to go with the rings.  He cupped Stiles’ cheek in his other hand, gazing into his eyes.  “Is there any question as to what we intend them to mean?”

“Nothing more than the reunion of our hearts,” Stiles said.  “Whatever else we wish for ourselves, we have all our lives to decide.”

* * *

 

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX1krt1vIgE>

Must've been in late September  
When last I climbed Reunion Hill  
I fell asleep on Indian Boulder  
And dreamed a dream I will not tell

I came home as the sun went down  
One eye trained upon the ground  
Even now I find their things  
Glasses, coins, and golden rings 

It's ten years since that ragged army  
Limped across these fields of mine  
I gave them bread, I gave them brandy  
Most of all, I gave them time

My well is deep, the water pure  
The streams are fed by mountain lakes  
I cleaned the brow of many a soldier  
Dowsing for my husband's face 

I won't forget our sad farewell  
And how I ran to climb that hill  
Just to watch him walk across the valley  
And disappear into the trees

Alone there in a sea of blue  
It circles every afternoon  
A single hawk in God's great sky  
Looking down with God's own eyes

He soars above Reunion Hill  
I pray he spirals higher still  
As if from such an altitude  
He might just keep my love in view

Must've been in late September  
When last I climbed Reunion Hill 

\- Richard Shindell, “Reunion Hill”


End file.
